Liverpool vs Tottenham Hotspur
Anfield hosts the tie of the round, and it arrives with one statistic hanging over it: Tottenham have not scored a Premier League goal this season. Four games, 360 minutes, nothing. That is a first in the club’s history.
Liverpool, meanwhile, are unbeaten under Andoni Iraola but were held goalless by Fulham at Anfield on Saturday. Both sides drew 0–0 at the weekend. That’s where the similarity ends.
Liverpool — where they stand
- Unbeaten in five across all competitions — two wins, three draws
- Six points from four Premier League matches
- Won only one of three at Anfield this season
- Beat Ipswich and Atlético Madrid before Saturday’s 0–0 with Fulham
The unbeaten run flatters slightly. Three of those five were draws, and Saturday exposed a bluntness in the final third that the Ipswich and Atlético results had papered over. Iraola’s side are hard to beat. They haven’t yet been consistently hard to keep out.
Tottenham — the goal drought
- Zero goals in four Premier League games — two defeats, two goalless draws
- Most recent: 0–0 at home to Everton, and 0–0 at Nottingham Forest
- But 5–1 against Charlton in the EFL Cup second round
The Charlton result matters more than it looks. De Zerbi’s reshaped attack scored five in the cup and nothing in four league games. That suggests the problem is partly about how they’re set up against Premier League opposition, not that the forwards can’t finish.
The Anfield record
| Metric | Detail |
|---|---|
| Liverpool’s last 5 home games vs Spurs | Unbeaten, four wins |
| Spurs’ last win at Anfield | May 2022 |
| Last meeting there | 1–1 draw, March |
| One previous EFL Cup meeting at Anfield | Liverpool won 4–0 |
That March draw was the first time in nearly four years Tottenham had avoided defeat at Anfield. The pattern is about as one-sided as fixtures between big clubs get.
Market
Pre-match prices
Liverpool at 1.67 implies roughly a 60% chance. Given the Anfield record and the state of Spurs’ attack, that looks about right rather than generous.
Our picks
Liverpool vs Tottenham
1. Liverpool win
The strongest of the three. Spurs haven’t scored in four league games, have lost four of their last five at Anfield, and Liverpool are unbeaten this season. Even allowing for cup rotation, the gap in attacking output is stark.
2. Liverpool to score two or more
The riskiest of the three, and worth being honest about. Liverpool have won just one of three at Anfield and were goalless against Fulham on Saturday. Backing them for two goals means backing an improvement on the exact thing that went wrong last time out.
The case for it: Tottenham’s defence has been busier than their clean sheets suggest, and Liverpool scored twice against both Ipswich and Atlético before the Fulham game. The attack works. It misfired once.
3. Liverpool over 5.5 corners
Territorial logic rather than a statistical one. A Spurs side that hasn’t scored in four league games is unlikely to come to Anfield and press high. If they sit deep, Liverpool see most of the ball in the final third, and corners follow possession against a low block.
Be aware: we don’t have verified corner averages for either side this season. This pick is reasoning from how the game is likely to be shaped, not from a corner data model. Treat it accordingly.
What could go wrong
Rotation is the biggest risk to all three picks. This is a third-round cup tie. Both managers are likely to change several players, and a rotated Liverpool XI against a rotated Spurs XI is a far less predictable game than the league fixture would be.
Two further things worth naming:
- Liverpool have drawn three of five this season. A tight 1–0 is entirely plausible, which wins the main pick and loses the second.
- Spurs scored five in the last cup round. If De Zerbi picks an attacking side freed from league caution, the shape of this game changes.
Andrew Robertson returns to Anfield in a Tottenham shirt, which is a subplot rather than a factor, but worth knowing if you’re watching.
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Before kickoff
Wait for confirmed line-ups. In a cup tie this matters more than usual. Teams are published about an hour before kickoff, and a heavily rotated Liverpool front line would weaken picks two and three considerably.
Result
We’ll settle these in our predictions table after full time — won, lost or refunded, all three published. Our full record is open, losses included.
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