Liverpool and Chelsea have been harder to separate this season than a kid’s fingers after playing with superglue. Jurgen Klopp’s side have had another fabulous season and finding weaknesses in their team is not easy. Like Manchester City, they not only attack with quality from a variety of areas, but they have been fabulously mean at the back.

The Blues must be at their best in every area of the field, but there are however just the odd few chinks in the armour of our opponents. Their constant belief in defending zonally at corners, and to some extent wide free-kicks, gives you an opportunity to get a run on their defenders. Ibrahima Konate and Virgil van Dijk are excellent in the air but if Toni Rudiger, Thiago Silva or Kai Havertz have a run on them, there are chances to be had.

At Anfield in the 1-1 draw at the start of the season, Kai got to the front post and scored an incredible header (pictured above). It had to be precise, and it was hardly what you would call a clear goalscoring opportunity, but it is an area that quite a few sides have attempted to benefit from. Liverpool have so much possession in most games that they give few corners away in the first place, so you must make the most of opportunities like this.

It is imperative the quality of ball in is right and there is a plan in place to keep the cross away from Van Dijk and Konate, if they are both playing. Thomas Tuchel will be well aware of this, and it will be something the squad are likley to have worked hard on in the days leading up to the game.

The other area where there may just be - if not exactly a weakness - an area not quite as strong as others, comes from one of Liverpool’s great strengths. Trent Alexander-Arnold, just like Andy Robertson, loves to get forward from full-back to deliver incredibly high-quality crosses.

These have to be countered, but it is easier said than done as their combined 25 Premier League assists this season shows. Only Mohamed Salah has provided more assists in the league than those two, which is incredible, but also not uncommon for the flying full-backs.

It does however leave a gap in behind both players on the break. Van Dijk covers Robertson brilliantly on the left, reading the play like a latter-day Alan Hansen, but they are not always so diligent behind Alexander-Arnold. There have been games when players have found plenty of space in that precise area and the Blues will have to use it again at Wembley.

Their sitting midfielders, the best at it being Jordan Henderson, do try to cover, but if Havertz, Timo Werner, Mason Mount or Christian Pulisic get a head start, they are hard to catch. In the 2-2 draw at the Bridge, Chelsea had success from that side when Pulisic scored, and he almost had another near the end from Marcos Alonso’s cross.

Looking even further back, when Chelsea won at Anfield in March 2021, Mount scored cutting in from that precise area. Werner also scored from precisely this sort of break, but it was ruled a nanometer offside. Late on, Mount slid a speeding Werner through for a one-on-one with Alisson, which the keeper was just able to block, but it should have been another goal. Once again, it stemmed from the same area and the same weakness. Tuchel will not have forgotten this.

As for the tactical line-ups, I expect both managers to stay true to their favoured systems. Liverpool almost never change from their 4-3-3, and although Thomas has tinkered now and again, against the Reds the 3-4-2-1 has been used in all three Liverpool matches this term, except after Reece James was sent off in the first game at Anfield. It is hard to imagine either boss blinking here, unless there are a host of injuries to key players.

The Carabao Cup final was a great example of how these games can go. Even though it finished 0-0 after 120 minutes, and it took 22 penalties to separate them, neither team was ever interested in a draw. These sides are set up to win games, play on the front foot and dominate possession.

That final at Wembley was amongst the most compelling I have been to in many years, and I expect this to be of the same high calibre. It might take a moment of unaccountable genius from Havertz or Salah, but one way or another it is a game another game I am very much looking forward to watching at Wembley.

What about the Women’s Cup final?

The Women’s final should be just as intriguing and just as hard to call. Manchester City, like their men’s side, almost always dominate possession, and lately they have become an unstoppable goal machine at the end of all that control. Emma Hayes knows, however, that it can also be City’s weak spot in certain circumstances.

Though City have had more of the ball in every game between the two sides this season, even when they lost 4-0 back in November in a game I was at, they can be caught out at the back and in deep midfield by overplaying.

Emma may plump for the 3-5-2 formation again this time because it would give Bethany England and the super-quick Sam Kerr the chance to dispossess the City side high up the field. When those two do that they can be lethal.

It also suits the situation defensively. City can have plenty of the ball, but if you close back into a back five, with three midfielders in front of that when out of possession, it is an incredibly hard system to break down.

The goals-against column this season is ridiculous for the Blues, with only 11 shipped in our 22 league games. That is not a fluke, that is great coaching, superb organisation and top-class tactical acumen.

All this will be needed against a City side who have forgotten their traumatic start to the season. Since the 1-0 defeat to Chelsea in February they have embarked on a run of 13 wins and a combined scoreline of 47-5!

It is too close to call, but it is worth remembering you don’t always need more of the ball, just more of the goals, and Chelsea, like City, have plenty of players who are capable of hitting the back of the net.