Every single Premier League game is important, and every single Premier League game has some kind of special meaning to someone. Whether it be their first ever live game or an encounter between their favourite team and their dad’s favourite team, there’s always something for everyone. When it comes to derby day, though, it’s a completely different story. There’s a certain ‘passion’ that comes with playing against your bitter rivals that you just don’t get every week. If you win it can make the next few weeks of your life incredibly enjoyable – but if you lose, then you might not want to go into work the next morning.

That’ll certainly be the case for Everton and Liverpool this weekend, with both teams being located just a mile apart from one another. It’s the kind of rivalry that burns deep for both sets of supporters and while you could argue that it’s more ‘friendly’ than some of the alternatives in the top flight, we’d respectfully disagree. These two sides don’t like each other, and if they’re given the chance to get one over on the other, they’ll take it with both hands. Plus, we always seem to get pretty great games out of this fixture which is always a bonus.

Everton have had a fairly inconsistent season to say the least, and the days of them challenging for European football seem like a distant memory now. With that being said, they’ve certainly got a good infrastructure to work with as we look ahead to the future. The Toffees have some game winners in their ranks and while they’ve struggled against the Reds in recent times, that doesn’t mean they don’t stand a chance on Sunday. There’s potential within this team, and it’s just a case of getting them to function as a cohesive unit.

It’s crunch time for Liverpool, as they find themselves in pole position in the race for the Premier League title. They’ve never won the league since it came into being back in 1992, and you just know it’s been eating them up inside. Jurgen Klopp finally seems to have put together a team worthy of taking them all the way, but they’ve still got Manchester City breathing down their necks. With the Champions League to worry about too, it’ll be interesting to see how they manage their resources between now and May – because there’s a lot on the line.

Everton’s last six games have hardly served as overwhelming inspiration for this game. They were knocked out of the FA Cup by lower league Millwall, before barely edging their way past bottom of the table Huddersfield. They went on to lose three games in a row to Wolverhampton Wanderers, Manchester City and Watford, although they were able to keep the scoreline pretty close in all three games. They were able to bounce back with an emphatic 3-0 triumph over Cardiff City in their last outing, but fans are still left to wonder what it’ll take for them to put some consecutive wins together.

Liverpool’s last six game stretch began with a disappointing 1-1 draw against Leicester, before registering the exact same scoreline against West Ham United. They showed their class in a 3-0 domination of Bournemouth, but they were able to break Bayern Munich down in the first leg of their Champions League knockout tie. They went on to draw 0-0 against Manchester United which many fans saw as another two points dropped (and rightly so), but they wound up silencing a lot of their critics with a 5-0 battering of high flying Watford.

This is one of the most frequent fixtures in the history of English football, and that’s no exaggeration. Liverpool currently lead the overall head to head standings 119-82 with 82 draws, with their first meeting taking place way back in 1894. Unfortunately, recent history hasn’t been kind to Everton, as they haven’t beaten Liverpool in their last 18 meetings dating all the way back to 2010. Their last encounter came back in early December when a late goal awarded the Reds all three points, and while it was still a pretty close game, Everton fans will be absolutely desperate to finally get one over on their rivals. Why? Because bragging rights are everything up there.

Kurt Zouma’s suspension is now over, and he’s expected to return to the starting XI in place of Phil Jagielka. Yerry Mina has also recovered and was able to make the bench during the week, so we should see him feature in some form during the derby. Andre Gomes is expected to come into the midfield, but aside from that, there won’t be too many changes to the team that beat Cardiff. That’s probably the best course of action, because as we’ve seen in the Premier League, momentum can take you a long way.

Roberto Firmino was absent during the week, but the expectation is that he’ll be available for the derby. Jordan Henderson is expected to captain the team despite being dropped against Watford, with Naby Keita being set to remain on the bench. In terms of quality, Liverpool should certainly feel pretty confident in their chances here, as they’ve g0t a lot of match winners within their ranks. Whether or not they show up on the day is another question altogether, but history tells us that you shouldn’t count the Reds out in this one – even when we’re approaching the final few minutes of the game at Goodison Park.

Everton vs Liverpool Betting Prediction

Liverpool have experienced a few roadblocks throughout the course of the season, and particularly in the last few weeks. They should be confident going into this one given how well they match up against Everton, but we still don’t think that confidence is going to be enough. We can picture a scenario in which Liverpool go behind pretty early on, probably from some kind of set piece. The Toffees will start to get physical and make life very difficult for the visitors, holding onto their advantage all the way through until the end of the game.

Then, we think the league leaders will equalise – which will give the false illusion that it’s a ‘good’ result. Any kind of dropped points is a bad result at this stage of the season, because we all know City are going to capitalise if they get the chance. We still believe this race will go right down to the wire, but we doubt Liverpool’s ability to not let the pressure get to them. Perhaps we’re wrong about that, but either way, all we want to see tomorrow is an entertaining game between two of the oldest rivals in the game.

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