As the Fantasy Premier League (FPL) Gameweek 32 deadline approaches, we continue our midweek round-up. This time, Liverpool’s first-leg loss to Champions League holders Paris Saint-Germain, where Alexander Isak‘s (£10.3m) comeback will concern Hugo Ekitike (£9.3m) owners.

Formation changes, a long-awaited comeback and a benching in need of an explanation – find it all below.

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MATCH FACTS

• Result: Paris Saint-Germain 2-0 Liverpool
• Starting XI: Mamardashvili, Konate, van Dijk, Gomez, Frimpong (Nyoni 91), Szoboszlai (Jones 78), Gravenberch, Mac Allister, Kerkez (Robertson 78), Wirtz (Gakpo 78), Ekitike (Isak 78)
• Changes from FA Cup: Two (Salah + Jones out, Frimpong + MacAllister in)

NO SHOTS ON TARGET

This wasn’t much of a close contest.

When all was said and done, PSG boasted 74% of possession, 40 touches in Liverpool’s box to their opponents’ nine, 18 shots rather than three, and will arrive at Anfield next week with a deserved two-goal advantage.

It could have been worse, too, if not for some smart stops by Giorgi Mamardashvili (£4.1m), standing in once again for the injured Alisson Becker (£5.4m). 

So toothless was the Reds’ attack that they failed to muster a single shot on target.

That wouldn’t worry Arne Slot if it were a one-off in an otherwise strong attacking season. But 2025/26 has been far from that.

Indeed, Liverpool keep being outshot by their opponents. They registered a combined 10 attempts on target in losses to Manchester City (FA Cup) and Brighton and Hove Albion (Premier League).

Things were better against Galatasaray in the previous round, but even Tottenham Hotspur beat them for efforts on target.

Coupled with being outrun by their opponents in most league games, it suggests this is a Liverpool team running out of both steam and ideas.

WHY SALAH WAS BENCHED

There aren’t many matches left now in Mohamed Salah’s (£14.0m) Liverpool career. Yet the Egyptian was denied a single minute of action on Wednesday. Starting on the bench, he remained there.

Speaking before kick-off, Slot suggested this decision was due to the Reds’ improving squad depth, as injuries begin to ease.

“It is always difficult to leave players out that work very hard and they deserve to start, Mo is definitely one of them but there are more players on the bench that work very hard to play.

“Add to that how much Mo has done for the club, how influential he’s been for me, for the club, that makes it difficult but I think it’s also quite common and not many times this season I had to make choices like that.

“We have players on the bench now who can impact the game, we are in a much better place than we have been throughout the whole season.” – Arne Slot on benching Mohamed Salah

Asked post-match why Salah didn’t make a cameo appearance, Slot pointed to his side’s struggles in containing PSG, with his gameplan turning out much worse than expected.

“I think in the last part of the game it was more about surviving for us than there was ever a chance that we could score.

“I think this was a 20, 25 minutes where we were only defending. Mo has so much [sic] qualities, but for Mo to be 20, 25 minutes defending inside his own box, I think it’s better for him to save his energy for a lot of games that are coming up in the upcoming weeks.” – Arne Slot on keeping Mohamed Salah benched

While this rest surely means Salah will start against Fulham on Saturday, this latest instance of his minutes being managed will do little to ease FPL managers’ concerns when it comes to potentially investing in this all-time great for one last hurrah.

WING-BACK SYSTEM FAILS

Salah’s benching aside, Wednesday brought yet another formational tweak from an increasingly tinker-prone manager.

We’ve seen the Reds line up in many shapes this term, with Slot’s hand often forced by injuries. However, this seemed to be more of an ill-fated attempt to press PSG high and tighten up after the 4-0 Man City drubbing.

Liverpool started with a back five for the second time this season – they lost that time, too – as Ibrahima Konate (£5.5m), Virgil van Dijk (£6.3m) and Joe Gomez (£4.9m) were flanked by the width of Jeremie Frimpong (£5.7m) and Milos Kerkez (£5.6m).

Simply put, the experiment failed.

“We were in survival mode for large parts of the game but maybe also the period of the season we are in, we are in survival mode. We want to create much more chances. We tried many times to get them high, but they were able to play through us when we went man-to-man. – Arne Slot

Frimpong, a wing-back role in his Leverkusen days, was wasteful in possession, and his high positioning did Konate no favours.

The latter was often caught out of position trying to cover the right flank, forcing van Dijk across to try and support. It threw the whole thing out of whack.

It’s surely unlikely we’ll see this system again, despite attempts to blame its failure on the attacking prowess of PSG, in particular the Parisians’ own wide defenders:

“There seems to be a lot of focus on the system, but what is the difference if I had played let’s say Rio [Ngumoha] or Cody Gakpo as a left winger? 

“Milos [Kerkez] had to play almost as a left winger facing [Achraf] Hakimi and then there were four defenders left, which we usually have. I could also explain it as a 4-3-3 with Florian [Wirtz] on the right, Hugo [Ekitike] in the middle and Milos on the left, three midfielders and four defenders.

“Because they are defenders, people now see it as five – and that is the way I would describe it as well – but the margins are really small. What if we had tried to play with real wingers here today, how would that have looked like against Hakimi and Nuno Mendes?” – Arne Slot

Slot has also had mixed success with his other line-ups this season.

In the most recent stretch of games alone, for example, a narrow 4-2-2-2 with Salah and Ekitike supported by Florian Wirtz (£8.3m) and the versatile Dominik Szoboszlai (£7.1m) – something that has worked before – ultimately failed against City last weekend. So did the 4-1-2-1-2 versus Brighton, even though it was successful in the Galatasaray second leg.

The two games before, meanwhile, saw two different 4-2-3-1 set-ups, with Frimpong and Rio Ngumoha (£4.3m) flanking Cody Gakpo (£7.3m) against Spurs, after Salah and Wirtz did the same for Ekitike in the Gala first leg.

ISAK BACK – BAD FOR EKITIKE?

A back four is probably reappearing, but what Slot does with his attackers is another matter.

Slot promised for several weeks that Isak – sidelined since suffering a leg break back in Gameweek 17 – would return at some unconfirmed point during this PSG double-header. Sure enough, the Swede made his comeback in Paris.

Given a quarter of an hour up front alongside Gakpo, Isak was part of a quadruple 78th-minute substitution. Not that he had much to do from an attacking sense, as the Reds struggled to cope with their hosts’ dominance.

Nonetheless, his return to fitness is a welcome sight for everyone associated with Liverpool – except maybe Ekitike and his FPL owners. The out-of-form Frenchman might begin having his minutes reduced.

Even if Isak isn’t ready to start yet, Slot has Gakpo and Salah as options up front versus Fulham, whether it’s 4-2-3-1 or 4-2-2-2. Given Ekitike has started consecutive cup games, and it’ll be PSG on Tuesday, don’t be surprised if he’s rested. The striker hasn’t started three games in a week since December, indeed.

Overall, a lack of Double Gameweeks, uncertainty in the attacking slots, and a shoddy recent defensive record beg the question of whether Liverpool’s assets are worthy of investment during the season run-in, despite some decent fixtures.