Liverpool take on Brighton & Hove Albion on Sunday but the man in the middle has previous with the Reds

Sam Barrott will take charge of Liverpool for the first time since Nottingham Forest's controversial penalty at Anfield earlier this season. The Reds take on free-scoring Brighton & Hove Albion as Fabian Hurzeler's side look to continue their phenomenal start to the campaign.

Barrott was in charge of the Reds' 2-2 draw with Forest in August when he awarded the visitors a penalty when Neco Williams went down after taking a shot. Morgan Gibbs-White subsequently stepped up and gave Oliver Glasner's side the lead before Victor Munoz equalised late on.

The incident sparked fury with Alisson taking his frustration out on the substitutions board, which had malfunctioned, denying the Reds from making a substitution around the time of the incident. Alisson was sanctioned by the FA for his outburst and fined £8,000.

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The 34-year-old Yorkshire referee will be in the middle for the crunch match with the Seagulls on Sunday with Michael Oliver on video assistant referee duty at Stockley Park.

At the time, Dermot Gallagher agreed with the decision from Barrott and claimed Alisson had fouled the Welsh defender. He said: "Alisson did the same tackle Man City against Matheus Nunes last season, he brought the player down and the referee gave the penalty.

"The same thing here: the referee gave the penalty. Both are penalties.

"The Phil Foden for Man City vs Newcastle [which wasn't given] was the catalyst for people saying: you can't just wipe out people for the sake of it. You've got to be mindful of what's happened."

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However, the Premier League's Key Match Incidents (KMI) panel found that there was an error from Barrott in awarding the penalty. It was suggested that the Brazilian shot-stoppers' contact was 'inevitable' as a result of trying to save the ball.

They said: "The panel felt that the referee’s call of a penalty was incorrect on-field, 3:2. The contact from Alisson was inevitable as a consequence of his momentum in attempting to save the ball – the contact made was not reckless and below the threshold for a penalty.

"However, the non-intervention by the VAR was unanimously supported on the basis that it was not a clear and obvious error."

Brighton go into Sunday's game on the back of their impressive 5-0 win over rivals Crystal Palace. Liverpool are beginning to grind out results and play attractive football under Andoni Iraola.

Both sides have been in European action this week with the Reds coming from behind to beat Villarreal 4-3 in a Champions League classic. While the Seagulls laboured to a stalemate Czechia minnows Jablonec.

The German said: "We did not play on our highest level, Jablonec defended well and defend box well, good movement in transition. Overall not the result we wanted, but we have to keep going.

"If you play 0-0 then you didn't create enough, that's definitely something we have to get better at. We have to understand what it needs to play in this cup, understand we have to be brilliant at the basics. We weren't good at the basics today, that's something we have to improve."