Liverpool will host Brentford at Anfield on Sunday in their final Premier League match of the season, a one-point test that will decide whether Mohamed Salah leaves Anfield with Champions League football in the bag.
The fixture, scheduled to kick off on 24 May 2026 at 16:00, arrives with Liverpool needing one point to be assured of Champions League qualification and with Andy Robertson and Salah set to play what has been described as their farewell for the club. Liverpool completed final preparations on Saturday at the AXA Training Centre, with the club sharing photos of the session as the squad readied itself for the decisive game.
The weight of the moment is clear in the numbers and the recent form. Liverpool enter the match after two defeats and one draw — setbacks against Manchester United, Chelsea and most recently Aston Villa — and they blew a chance to secure Champions League qualification in that loss to Villa. Brentford sit ninth in the table and are not idle: the Bees beat West Ham 3-0 just weeks ago and most recently drew 2-2 with Crystal Palace, meaning the match at Anfield carries European permutations for both clubs.
For Liverpool, the task is simple on paper: four points clear of Bournemouth, who sit three points behind and would require an improbable seven-goal swing plus a Liverpool loss to overhaul them. For Brentford, ninth place still leaves scope for a Europa League or Conference League finish depending on other results, turning the fixture into more than a ceremonial farewell for Liverpool’s departing players.
The programme around the game will be familiar to supporters: the match will be available to watch live in the UK via Sky Sports+ and Sky Go. Inside the Liverpool camp, the mood was described in a club briefing that showed the final training pictures and noted the players’ focus ahead of a match they must take one point from to guarantee Champions League football.
Tension arrives in two forms. On the pitch, Liverpool must stop the slide that included two defeats and a draw in their last three league outings. Off it, the injury picture presented in the build-up introduces a second layer of uncertainty: Arne Slot’s squad was reported to have several unavailable players through injury, a list that, according to the information circulated around the match, included Alisson Becker, Conor Bradley, Wataru Endo, Stefan Bajcetic, Jeremie Frimpong, Giovanni Leoni and Hugo Ekitike. That catalogue of absences, unusual in its composition, complicates selection choices and raises questions about depth and rotation in a game with so much riding on a single point.
Brentford’s recent results — their win over West Ham and the draw with Crystal Palace — show a side still capable of upsetting expectations, and their season since returning to the top flight in 2021 has given them the platform to push for European places. For Liverpool, the narrative has been shaped in part by last summer’s loss of Diogo Jota and the aftermath the squad endured, a strain that players and staff have acknowledged publicly in recent months as they chased top-four safety.
This match will settle two immediate storylines: whether Liverpool can deliver the minimum they need after a nervous run-in, and whether Salah and Robertson leave amid the relief of Champions League qualification or the frustration of another near-miss. If Liverpool avoid defeat, they will have done what they were asked to do: secure Europe’s top club competition and allow a farewell at home to land as a celebration rather than a consolation.
