John Aldridge looks ahead to Liverpool's League Cup clash with Chelsea and a reunion with two familiar faces in the second half of his weekly ECHO colum

Liverpool can't make the same mistake as they did last year against Crystal Palace in the League Cup. Arne Slot threw the kids and fringe players in and we got mauled. We can't do that with Chelsea because they're out of Europe.

They need the cup, they need it. And they will come to Anfield and play their strongest side.

We've got to match them and it's going to be tough. And I'll tell you what, it's tough for the manager because we've got injuries and you want to keep the players fresh for the league and for Europe.

It's not a great situation when you've got so many injuries, because you’ve got to put out a team that's going to fight against Chelsea and get us into the next round. Because we want to win the trophy, don't we?

We have to be careful because Chelsea have got really good players, regardless of their results. They can hurt you on a given day.

Like Palace hurt us, many times last year, but especially in the cup when we were miles away from the quality that could match them.

It's hard for the manager. Obviously the goalkeeper will get changed. I don't know what he’ll do elsewhere at the back though.

Every game coming up is tough now. We’ve got Arsenal on Sunday. And they come and keep on coming, thick and fast.

And I don't envy the manager, but we do want a cup run and you win this game and you’re in the quarter-finals. So it's a tough one. It really is a tough one.

Alonso and Henderson won’t get heroes’ welcome

Jordan Henderson and Xabi Alonso will be back at Anfield. They’ve been given heroes’ welcomes in the past, when returning with new sides, but they won’t get that now. Not now they’re representing Chelsea.

They’ll get a bit of appreciation. At the end of the day, it is what it is. They've moved on.

Jordan Henderson, looking back, it was a wrong decision to let him go. We were short of leaders.

I know he probably didn’t fit the criteria of the owners at the time. I don't know how it went, maybe he wanted to go and get loads of dough. Maybe that’s what he was after?

I don't know, but he had a couple more seasons in him, as a leader in the dressing room at least, but even coming on in games, starting when needed, like he's doing now.

But Chelsea and Liverpool never really got on. We know that.

When you see him kissing the Chelsea badge, from a fans’ point of view… But he's got every right to do it, by the way. I've got to say that.

But, we’re Liverpool fans and we can be a bit strange in that matter.

So I think they'll get well respected. But they're not going to have their names sung. When they came back with Bayer Leverkusen and Brentford, they had their names sung. But they won’t now. No chance.

Iraola has restored fighting spirit

I am liking what I see from Andoni Iraola as Liverpool head coach. He has made a big difference in a short space of time.

If things weren’t going right for him, it would be easy to look at Chelsea and Xabi Alonso and wish we’d brought him back to the club instead. But there is none of that.

All you want is honesty on the pitch. And Iraola has restored that. After last year, the players are battling again. Like they did at the weekend.

They battled, they put the foot in, they put the head in. They are out there fighting the opposition and that's all we want.

Last year we got out battled, outrun, outfought, out everything. Now it's a different mentality that the manager has got into them.

And we're back to normal, where we were a few years ago under Jurgen Klopp and perhaps also when we won the league.