While the bulk of the action in the English Premier League’s opening week will take place on Saturday and Sunday the season will officially get started on Friday night as Liverpool welcomes newly promoted Norwich City to Anfield. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Liverpool had an extremely eventful season in 2018-2019 that brought both disappointment and success. They missed out on the elusive Premiership Championship by a single point to Manchester City but were able to win the Champions League in extremely dramatic fashion. Manager Jurgen Klopp is now trying to put all of that behind his team and get them to focus on the task at hand. More specifically, he wants the team to be ‘angry and greedy’: \u201cIt\u2019s the new season again. We have to be angry again, we have to be greedy again, we have to be all these things.”<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Norwich City not only earned promotion to the Premiership they won the Football Championship in the process. There’s another interesting stat regarding the performance of Championship winning sides in their first season in the Premier League–the last five have managed to stay up at the top level of English football after the initial season. We’ve got a betting position based on that bit of information. Norwich manager Daniel Farke comes from the Borussia Dortmund system and has brought in a number of players from that side. Sharp football enthusiasts will also remember that Liverpool’s Klopp came over from Borussia Dortmund. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Klopp spoke highly of Norwich’s performance in the Championship last year: \u201cThey were really special for a Championship team last year with the way they played. There was a clear structure, a clear plan. There was little coincidence in the game because everything looked properly planned out so they have all my respect. In these kinds of fixtures, with all the stories around them, they are always the banana skins. They are made for something like that. If you are not ready for it, if you are not 100 per cent, then you will slip. They are too good for that.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n James Milner should be back in the lineup for Liverpool though the status of Sadio Mane is up in the air. Klopp was vague about his status though he did say he would be ‘available’. Mane just returned from playing in the African Cup of Nations and although Klopp said he’s fit he might be held out for precautionary reasons. Liverpool was nasty at Anfield last season going 17-2-0 in Premiership play and they’ve lost only 1 of their last 25 in regulation time. They’ve won 8 straight at Anfield in all competitions scoring a whopping 26 goals in that streak.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It’s asking too much from Norwich to beat Liverpool at Anfield in their first game back at the Premiership level. The Canaries were a good defensive side last year but the Premier League is a different matter entirely and they’ll likely be without centre-back Christoph Zimmerman for this game. Liverpool throttled West Ham United 4-0 to open the season last year and there’s no reason to think it won’t happen again in this matchup. That being said, Norwich is a solid and well coach sided and they should be able to stay up in the Premier League this season. There are soccer betting odds<\/a> on ‘teams to stay up’ and we’ll back Norwich here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n