3 players who could break into Liverpool starting XI after Arne Slot admission

Having beaten Brighton in the Carabao Cup midweek, Arne Slot and Liverpool must do the same thing again this weekend in the Premier League. And with the week ahead containing Bayer Leverkusen and Aston Villa, the team selection could be intriguing.

Kostas Tsimikas missed out on playing in the cup fixture which could hint at his involvement from the off here. Andy Robertson could then play in the next two matches, potentially, with Slot pointing to his injury at the start of the campaign that stopped him playing a full part in pre-season as a reason for his minutes needing to be managed.

Longer-term, Tsimikas could even challenge Robertson for the left-back berth. Robertson was beaten too easily by Bukayo Saka for the opening goal last weekend, though the Arsenal winger can cause problems for plenty of opponents, and the Greek understudy has done well in recent appearances.

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"I really liked what I saw from players that haven't played that much this season," Slot admitted during his post-Brighton press conference on Wednesday. "They were able to play the similar style that we usually do and they brought quality into the game. That makes it even harder for me to make line-ups in the upcoming weeks."

So who else, aside from Tsimikas, will be realistically eyeing up a place the starting XI moving forward? Cody Gakpo, battling Luis Diaz, is another who could move ahead of his rival in the pecking order. Gakpo came off early midweek which could hint at his involvement from the off here. The Dutchman, like Tsimikas, might get Brighton rather than Leverkusen and Aston Villa.

"He (Gakpo) has been a good player for Liverpool for a long time now and he continues doing that and that's a good thing," Slot said. "For me, he is a regular starter. He's not starting every game, but he started on a regular basis. And he's in a tough competition with Luis Diaz, who, when he went to the left, also scored a goal."

Elsewhere, Curtis Jones will want to overtake Dominik Szoboszlai in the number 10 role — though once Harvey Elliott returns, he will have even more competition for that position in the side — and Darwin Nunez could get ahead of Diogo Jota. For both of those positions, things have looked fairly well set so far under Slot, but as the injury to Jota proved, that can change quickly.

Jones has the talent to play the number 10 role at his best, but his best route to game time might be a mixture of covering for Mac Allister and Szoboszlai — and potentially Ryan Gravenberch too. If Nunez can get into a real groove and find the net regularly, however, he has the ceiling to become the first pick as number nine.

Slot has been fairly settled with his team selection so far in his Liverpool tenure. Nothing is set in stone, though. As the campaign progresses, Tsimikas, Jones, Gakpo and Nunez look best-placed to break into the strongest XI and it will be up to each of them to further force Slot's hand.