After a big win over Sunderland that handed the Black Cats their first home defeat of the season and kept Liverpool’s Champions League hopes for next year alive, Florian Wirtz was asked about the significance of the upcoming FA Cup clash with Brighton at Anfield.
His response is what every Liverpool fan should want to hear: "The club deserves to win trophies, and the fans [as well]; of course us players we also always want to win something. So there's one opportunity to go a step closer to a trophy," he said.
He's absolutely right.
Perhaps the FA Cup’s popularity has diminished in an era where Premier League and Champions League football dominate global viewership and financial opportunity, but there’s no doubt the most historic cup competition in the game still carries a great deal of weight.
An Opportunity for All
Just ask Crystal Palace, whose fanbase went ballistic celebrating the Eagles' triumph last spring— a victory that delivered the first major trophy in the club’s 120-year history.
While a surprise FA Cup loss to Plymouth last season ultimately became an afterthought as the Reds surged to the summit of English football, Arne Slot would do well to treat lifting that piece of silverware with the utmost importance.
Club icon Jürgen Klopp, who won the cup during his time at Liverpool, once described it as “a massive competition.”
The aforementioned result against Sunderland was highly important, but with Chelsea and United still controlling their own destinies, let’s assume for the sake of argument that Liverpool miss out on Champions League qualification and fall short of European glory this season.
Given the sheer talent within the squad, that could justifiably see Slot depart the club.
However, even under those circumstances, if the Dutchman were to guide Liverpool to FA Cup triumph this campaign, it would be difficult to justify parting ways with a manager who had secured two of England’s most prestigious trophies— each demanding vastly different paths to success— in his first two seasons at the helm.
Adding another FA Cup to the club's eight should be something the players should be doing everything they can to achieve as well.
Silverware never gets old
Veterans like Mohamed Salah and Virgil van Dijk have already won every major honor available to them on Merseyside; but with their time in the shirt growing increasingly limited, the opportunity to lift one more trophy should carry even greater weight for the squad’s stalwarts.
On the flip side, it’s encouraging to see new signings like Wirtz already embracing the importance of the competition.
Ensuring that both he and the likes of Hugo Ekitike experience a trophy, even amid a challenging debut season, would show that even an underperforming Liverpool can still win big games, reinforcing the idea that joining the club wasn’t a mistake.
Naturally, Brighton—a tricky opponent who have never won a top-flight trophy and approach each season knowing they won’t challenge for the Premier League—will be looking for their own “Palace moment” and will certainly study how Plymouth pulled off last season’s upset.
What they’ll find are two major but simple flaws from Liverpool: the Reds made a staggering 10 changes from their most recent Premier League game at the time, erasing much of the squad’s cohesion, and displayed a clear lack of intensity—likely fueled by the FA Cup’s perceived lack of importance to the team last season.
Slot is managing an unbelievable number of injuries, particularly at right back, so I’m all for rotating a few players to reduce the risk for usual starters—such as giving Rio Ngumoha a chance amid a dull patch from Cody Gakpo, or resting VVD/ Konaté after Joe Gomez delivered a strong shift against Sunderland.
But beyond a few tweaks, the manager should field a lineup close to what we’d expect for a typical league match.
Furthermore, a lack of intensity can be addressed by drilling home just how impactful an FA Cup win would be all throughout training this week.
Trophies last forever, and the financial reward wouldn’t be insignificant either—the winners this season are set to receive over £2 million.
There’s no doubt this season has been a major disappointment for the club, but with the opportunity to still claim two highly prestigious trophies, Saturday’s action at Anfield offers another chance to salvage something from an otherwise “crisis” season.
After failing to approach domestic cup competitions with the necessary vigor, in both last season’s loss to Plymouth and this season’s Carabao exit to Palace, one can hope that both the manager and players will give Saturday’s clash everything they’ve got.
The aim should be to secure two wins from two and head into the season’s most important stage with focus and the passion to lift at least one piece of silverware.