Okay so here's the team that faced Arsenal in the last round of the cup.
Kelleher, Williams, Milner, Gomez, van den Berg, Lallana, Keïta, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Elliott, Origi, Brewster
Subs: Adrián, Kane, Larouci, Clarkson, Koumetio, Jones, Chirivella
There's probably seven players in that side that Klopp would want to include in his World Club Cup squad.
Milner, Gomez, Lallana, Keita, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Origi, Adrian.
Adrian - can probably travel and use Lonergan in his place.
Down to six.
There's then an argument to be made about sending Milner, Oxlade-Chamberlain and Origi to Qatar to prevent us looking too light, but we should be able to win a semi final without them?
And arguably without Oxlade-Chamberlain and Origi it's very hard to see even the remotest chance of us beating what will be a far more senior Villa team at the QF stage.
So I'd keep the League Cup 18/17 from the last round intact, send a strong first XI to Qatar and then send half a dozen of them to Qatar after the League Cup game. Doing that should also stop any potential squad disharmony about who gets to fly out first etc, which 'could' create an issue for Klopp?
Logged