Crystal Palace vs Liverpool Prediction

We look ahead to the opening game of Premier League Matchday 16 with our Crystal Palace vs Liverpool prediction and preview. Can Roy Hodgson thwart his former employers at Selhurst Park on Saturday lunchtime?

• The Opta supercomputer predicts a Liverpool win at Selhurst Park, with the Reds winning 58.8% of pre-match simulations against Crystal Palace.
• Liverpool have lost just one of their last 26 Premier League matches (W17 D8).
• Palace have not won any of their last 12 Premier League meetings with Liverpool (D2 L10), their longest ongoing winless run against an opponent.

Liverpool will be aiming to keep the pace with Arsenal in the Premier League title race and extend their impressive run in the competition when they visit struggling Crystal Palace for Saturday’s clash at Selhurst Park.

The Reds have lost just one of their last 26 Premier League games, a last-gasp 2-1 reverse at Tottenham Hotspur way back on 30 September, with a battling 2-0 victory over relegation-threatened Sheffield United in their last outing on Wednesday night at Bramall Lane boosting their title hopes. Since their defeat 4-1 defeat at Manchester City in April, Liverpool have won more points than any other side in the competition (59).

Virgil van Dijk coolly volleyed in a first-half opener on a cold South Yorkshire night in Sheffield before Dominik Szoboszlai sealed three points deep into stoppage time. Liverpool have won all 15 Premier League games that the Dutch defender has scored in, the best 100% record for any side in the competition’s history.

Trent Alexander-Arnold created the first goal at Sheffield United with a fine corner delivery, the England full-back’s 75th assist in all competitions for Liverpool – since his club debut in October 2016, only Kevin De Bruyne (129) and Mohamed Salah (80) have more for Premier League sides.

Salah failed to score for the third successive Premier League appearance, with the Egyptian forward still on the hunt for his 200th Liverpool goal. When he hits that landmark goal, he’ll become just the fifth player to reach 200 goals for the club after Ian Rush (346), Roger Hunt (285), Gordon Hodgson (240) and Billy Liddell (228).

Jürgen Klopp did head back to Merseyside with one concern, though, after losing World Cup-winning Argentina midfielder Alexis Mac Allister to injury midway through the second half at Bramall Lane. The former Brighton man could join a growing absentee list that also includes Alisson, Joël Matip, Diogo Jota, Thiago Alcântara, Stefan Bajcetic and Andrew Robertson.

Klopp may at least take some solace from Liverpool’s position in the league table, sitting just two points behind league-leading Arsenal, who snatched a dramatic 4-3 win at Luton Town on Wednesday, and two ahead of third-placed Aston Villa after Unai Emery’s side secured a hard-fought 1-0 win over Manchester City to send Pep Guardiola’s defending champions down to fourth.

In complete contrast to their visitors, Palace have just one win in their last eight Premier League games – a 2-0 success at Burnley – and slipped down to 14th in the league table after a 2-0 reverse at home to Bournemouth on Wednesday.

The Eagles lost English defender Tyrick Mitchell to a first-half muscle injury at Selhurst Park when already trailing to Marcos Senesi’s header, before substitute Kieffer Moore confirmed victory for Andoni Iraola’s away side with a 91st-minute strike. Roy Hodgson’s lineup for Liverpool will likely be without Mitchell, as well as the injured Eberechi Eze, Cheick Doucouré, Rob Holding and goalkeeper Dean Henderson.

Palace were jeered off at Selhurst Park in midweek and matters could worsen with Klopp’s men next to visit before a thankless trip to Man City’s Etihad Stadium – and Hodgson’s record against his former side is abject, too. He has lost each of his last eight Premier League games against Liverpool since a 1-0 win with West Brom in April 2012. In fact, previous Liverpool managers in the Premier League have lost 17 of their last 19 games against their former Anfield club in the competition – the exceptions being two Brendan Rodgers wins with Leicester City (February and December in 2021) – and Hodgson’s injury-hit side will struggle to improve that record.

Klopp has won 12 of his 16 Premier League meetings with Crystal Palace (D2 L2), his joint-most against a side in the competition (also 12 vs West Ham). Across his managerial career, only against SC Freiburg (13) has he won more league games.

Indeed, Liverpool have never lost an away Premier League game against Palace under Klopp, winning seven out of eight visits (D1) – their last defeat was in November 2014 under Brendan Rodgers.

Nothing could separate these two sides last season, though, with Luis Díaz cancelling out Wilfried Zaha’s goal in a 1-1 draw that saw Darwin Núñez dismissed on his home debut at Anfield, before a goalless draw in February’s return meeting at Selhurst Park.

Overall, Palace are winless in their last 12 Premier League meetings with Liverpool (D2 L10), which is their longest ongoing run without victory against an opponent. Based on current form, that could stretch further here.

Liverpool’s free-scoring form has them challenging at the Premier League summit heading into Matchday 16, having scored at least once in each of their last 32 games in all competitions – the second-longest such run in their history after a 34-game stretch from April to December 2021.

However, Liverpool have won just one of their seven Premier League away games kicking off at 12:30pm on a Saturday (D3 L3) since the start of last season, coming from behind to beat Wolves 3-1 in September. Overall, their lowest points-per-game average is in the 12:30 slot (1.76 – P38 W18 D13 L7) across all kick-off times played under Klopp in the league.

Klopp will fancy amending that underwhelming record, though, as Palace have failed to score in four Premier League home games this season against Bournemouth, Nottingham Forest, Fulham and Arsenal.

Additionally, since the start of October, no side have won fewer Premier League games than Crystal Palace (W1 D2 L5), while only Sheffield United (six) have scored fewer goals than the London club (seven) – the pressure will continue to mount on Hodgson with defeat here.

The Opta Player Ratings are something we introduced ahead of 2023-24. For a quick primer on how they’re calculated, you can check our explainer here.

Before kick-off in this match, here are the top five performing players from both teams in the 2023-24 Premier League according to the Opta Player Ratings:

Marc Guéhi: 72.9 (out of 100)
Joachim Andersen: 72.9
Tyrick Mitchell: 71.8
Odsonne Édouard: 67.1
Jefferson Lerma: 66.2

Dominik Szoboszlai: 77.9 (out of 100)
Alisson Becker: 77.5
Mohamed Salah: 74.6
Virgil van Dijk: 73.2
Andrew Robertson: 72.2

These Opta Player Ratings also power our set of brand-new, free-to-play gaming experiences, which you can play on Opta Analyst all season long.

The Opta Power Rankings are a global team ranking system that assigns an ability score to over 13,000 domestic football teams on a scale between zero and 100, where zero is the worst-ranked team in the world and 100 is the best team in the world.

Ahead of kick-off on Saturday, here is the Opta Power Ranking for both sides.

Liverpool are backed by the Opta supercomputer to continue their Premier League title charge, with an away victory at Selhurst Park predicted in 58.8% of 10,000 data-powered simulations ahead of kick-off.

Hodgson’s record against his former side is poor and that reflects in the predictions as Palace won just 19% and a draw occurred in 22.2% of the data-led scenarios.

However, Man City still rank as the favourites to lift the Premier League trophy. According to Opta’s model Guardiola’s side defend their title in 44.7% of simulations and Arsenal secure the league in 26.4%, with Liverpool slightly back at 26.2%. Palace have a 19.4% chance of finishing in their current 14th position in the league standings, although their relegation likelihood has jumped to 4.2% after the Bournemouth defeat and a positive result for Everton versus Newcastle on Thursday night.

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