Next Thursday, 1st of January 2015, a reinvigorated Liverpool will entertain a Leicester in need for points at the emblematic Anfield Road for round 20 of the English Premier League, on a match with special significance for the home side, who may clinch their third win in a row for the first time this season, and also for the Foxes, who despite their last weekend’s win, remain at the bottom of the table with just 13 points from 19 matches.

After securing a narrow but very important win over Burnley on Boxing Day, Liverpool secured the three points once again last Monday by defeating Swansea at Anfield Road. The Reds put up an overall good performance, especially after overcoming their initial nervousness, and clinched a solid but not easy 4-1 win. It was only on the 33rd minute of the first-half that Liverpool opened the score, when the unlikely Alberto Moreno sent home a splendid cross from Jordan Henderson. With plenty of time still to play, the home side increased their lead when Adam Lallana took advantage of a Fabianski’s childish mistake soon after the break. Nevertheless, one minute later, Liverpool’s defence line proved once again that they are still miles away from being fully synchronized, when Sigurdson brought back the Swans into the match. Despite Swansea’s instant response, Liverpool rallied their troops once again and scored the third from an excellent individual effort from Lallana and the fourth after an unfortunate own goal by Jonjo Shelvey, who had a bitter reencounter with his former team.

Next Thursday’s match against Leicester will definitely be a good opportunity for Liverpool to continue winning, but they will certainly need to work hard in order to achieve that.

As for Leicester, who are having a season to forget on their return to the English football top tier, they’ve managed to apparently sweep the bad streak of results and bad luck under the rug after their win against Hull last weekend. Their win at the KC Stadium was only their third so far this season and put an abrupt end to a disgraceful streak of results that pushed the team to the bottom of the table. A single goal by Riyad Mahrez gave the Foxes the three points they were desperately looking for, but a defeat at Anfield could once again throw the team into the devastating spiral they have already found themselves in this season.

Liverpool

Stats: W-3 L-1 D-1

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Leicester

Stats: W-1 L-4 D-0

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Possible Line-ups

Liverpool (3-4-3) – Mignolet - Sahko - Skrtel - Lovren - Leiva - Henderson - Markovic - Gerrard - Sterling - Coutinho - Lallana

Leicester (4-4-2) - Hamer - de Laet - Simpson - Morgan - Wasilewski - Schlupp - Cambiasso - James - Mahrez - Ulloa - Nugent

Prediction

Liverpool 2 Leicester 1