After a late goal from Phil Jagielka in the Merseyside Derby kept Liverpool behind Manchester United, Chelsea, Arsenal, Tottenham and Manchester City in what has been a start of the season starkly contrasting to the exciting Liverpool side who played attractive costless-flowing football from last season where they just missed out on winning the Premier League title, Brendan Rodgers' faltering side are looking for a boost in the Champions League.
The Reds returned into the World's most prestigious competition two weeks ago when they hosted newcomers Ludogorets at Anfield as the special weekday nights in Liverpool returned after a 5 year absence.
Despite victory in the opening Champions League game week their performance was nothing to savour with a Steven Gerrard penalty in added time earning them the three points as Real Madrid humiliated Basel 5-1. They have had nothing to savour in the Premier League either with defeat to West Ham and Aston Villa and draws against Everton in the Premier League as well as a 2-2 draw in the Capital One Cup against Middlesborough and just two wins in six matches, against Ludogorets and Tottenham.
Basel have been enjoying similar on-off form throughout the beginning of their season, losing to Grasshopper before a humiliating 5-1 defeat to Real Madrid. They have been on the other side of humiliation as well, however, beating Winterthur 4-0 as well as defeating Valduz and Young Boys before a 1-1 draw against Thun.
| Liverpool 1-1 Everton | Basel 1-1 Thun |
|---|---|
| Liverpool 2-2 Middlesborough | Basel 3-1 Valduz |
| West Ham 3-1 Liverpool | Winterthur 0-4 Basel |
| Liverpool 2-1 Ludogorets | Real Madrid 5-1 Basel |
| Liverpool 0-1 Aston Villa | Grasshopper 3-1 Basel |
| Tottenham 0-3 Liverpool | Basel 3-1 Young Boys |
| LAST SIX FIXTURES | LAST SIX FIXTURES |
When Group B was fully drawn out eyes were drawn to an encounter between Liverpool and Real Madrid, with their victories in the European Cup totaling to an immense 15 victories. Yet, while Real Madrid dominated Basel, Liverpol discovered the Champions League Group Stages can produce all kinds of shocks, even from teams as small as Ludogorets.
Gerard Houlier guided Liverpool to a remarkable comeback after conceding three goals in 30 minutes and scraped a draw which saw Liverpool knocked out. Only Steven Gerrard remains from that side, however, and he will be the only one warning of the intense atmosphere inside the St Jakob Park which holds 38,000 Basel fans.
TEAM NEWS
The away side are without Joe Allen, Emre Can and Glen Johnson who have knee, ankle and hip injuries respectively. Daniel Sturridge may make his return after a late fitness test ensured he had no place in the squad against Everton at the weekend.
Brendan Rodgers hopes the England forward will recover fully before they put him back into the limelight and says he wasn't far away from being included in the squad against Everton and that Basel is a possibility, yet SkySports report that he has not made it in time to travel with the squad.
“He wasn’t really close for this game,” the Reds boss said. “We needed to see if he could train on the Friday, but I got the message on the Thursday night that he would struggle, so he wasn’t really close to playing.
“I’ll see how he is (for Basel). He wasn’t far away for Everton, but he certainly wasn’t fit enough to be on the bench.”
Mamadou Sakho is understood to not have traveled with the squad after storming out of Anfield following Brendan Rodgers dropping him from the match day squad against Everton.
GK – Simon Mignolet
RB – Javier Manquillo
CB – Martin Skrtel
CB – Dejan Lovren
LB – Alberto Moreno
RM – Raheem Sterling
CM – Jordan Henderson
CM – Steven Gerrard
AM – Adam Lallana
LM – Philippe Coutinho
ST – Mario Balotelli
PLAYERS TO LOOK OUT FOR
Basel
Marco Streller - The 33-year-old Basel-born, Basel legend has heaps of experience at Basel and more importantly in the Champions League with the Swiss club. The younger players in the side have a legend to look towards for guidance should they require it.
Derlis Gonzalez - The Paraguayan midfielder lacks experience at 20 years of age but certainly makes up for it with his speed and goal-getting. Not only that but during his brilliant start to the season, he's been creating goal after goal as well.
Basel is the origin of Bayern Munich youngster Xherdan Shaqiri and they certainly have more talent in their ranks now.
Serey Die - The midfielder with the crazy hairstyle has the ability to make a key pass and although he may not be starting, look out for him in years to come.
Luca Zuffi - Treading away from the younger side of things is Luca Zuffi who arrived at Basel this summer and is 24 years old. Like Gonzalez he's been both creating goals and scoring them himself.
Liverpool
Raheem Sterling - Everyone knows the agile, speedy winger but he's the only player in the Liverpool side that has been exciting this season and will have a huge impact on Wednesday nights proceeding.
Brendan Rodgers spoke of Sterling's obvious threat and how he will be man marked in Switzerland and throughout Liverpool's Champions League campaign.
"It's pretty clear, from the games this season, that Raheem sometimes has two or three men around him at all times," Rodgers explained.
"If you look at the game against Ludogorets, he had a marker following him everywhere, and I bet that he can expect to have a lot more of that kind of attention.
"Is it affecting Raheem's performances? Not really. He has been brilliant so far and, hopefully, he will continue to keep that kind of consistency in his game.
"What we have to do as a team is to try to release the pressure from him. All I ask of Raheem is that, tactically, he fits into the way the team is playing. We put him in areas of the pitch where he can hurt opponents.
"Thankfully, he is a very humble boy. You only need to look at his work-rate, how he presses the ball and how hungry he is to get the ball back."
The last time these two sides met was in the 2002/03 season and while the 0-0 deadlock at Anfield failed to entertain to an extent of preaching about, a stunning 3-3 comeback by Liverpool in Basel is certainly worth reiterating.
In similar style to in Istanbul when Liverpool won their fifth Champions League in 2005, the Reds were 3-0 down before half time but after what must have been one intense and brilliant team talk by Gerard Houlier, the team which included Steven Gerrard leveled things up. They did, however, go out of the Champions League that season in the group stage while Basel went through to the next round.
MATCH STATS
Basel
• Including matches in the Champions League and Europa League, Basel had a great home record in Europe in 2013/14: W5 D2 L1.
• They beat Chelsea away (2-1) and at home (1-0) in last season's UEFA Champions League group stage.
• Their overall home record against English teams is W4 D3 L4.
Liverpool
• They won their opening Group B fixture 2-1 against Ludogorets, their first UEFA Champions League fixture since December 2009.
• They beat 5-3 at BSC Young Boys last time they played in Switzerland, in the 2012/13 UEFA Europa League group stage.
• The Reds have never failed to score in Switzerland, totalling 14 goals over five games.