Rafa must be like a kid in a candy store ahead of this weekends Merseyside derby. Although its doubtful that Carragher and Riise will be available, everyone else appears fit and raring to go and having Momo Sissoko returning to fitness will be a huge boost, Click Here.

However, it’s upfront that we seem to have almost an embarrassment of riches at the moment. Rafa has a delicious dilemma. Four top class strikers who all have plenty to offer, all have a legitimate claim to be in the starting line-up and more importantly, all four are hungry and desperate to play. It’s the kind of problem all managers love to have and yet more evidence of the strength in depth that Rafa has brought to the squad. So the question all Reds fans are asking is who will start upfront on Saturday?

Robbie Fowler: We were all delighted to see The Legend return to Anfield last January. Although he was clearly lacking in match fitness when he arrived, he still did enough in his appearances at the backend of last season to show that there was still plenty of the old magic left and much to delight of Reds fans everywhere, he earned himself a years contract. However, he has become somewhat overshadowed recently with the summer arrivals of Bellamy, Kuyt and the scoring exploits of Peter Crouch. But Fowler has bags of experience and is no stranger to scoring in Merseyside derbies, so surely he must start!

Peter Crouch: Big Crouchy just can’t stop scoring at the moment Click Here. His goal yesterday in England’s 1-0 win over Macedonia was his 11th in just 14 appearances for his country and I’ve been told it was also his 8th goal in his last 7 appearances for club and country, which is a remarkable scoring run. In these days of self publicising football prima donna’s, it’s really great to see one of the games true nice guys receiving such praise. It’s also ironic to see that a lot of the praise being heaped on him by the press is from some of the very same guys who slated him and gave him such stick last season, but that’s the British media for you. Anyway, Crouchy on fire at the moment so surely he must start!

Craig Bellamy: Managed to get on the score sheet in some of our early pre-season games and although he hasn’t found the net in recent games, he has put in some good performances and is always a threat. The hostile environment at Goodison Park will be meat and drink to him, in fact he would relish it. Bellamy seems to be tailor-made for such games and his pace upfront would be a huge asset against the blueshite defence, so ….eh …..surely he must start!

Dirk Kuyt: His debut performance in the second half of our last match against West Ham, has got to rate as the most impressive debut performances I’ve ever seen. The Liverpool crowd can be a tough audience and to win them over with less then 40 minutes on the pitch, really takes some doing but that’s exactly what he did. He scored yesterday for Holland and if he managed to do something special against blueshite this week and CSKA London next week, then he will rapidly achieve sainthood among Red’s fans in record breaking time. He is absolutely desperate to play in the derby and …..eh…mmmh…. ah what the hell, surely he must start! Click Here.

So as you can see, it’s really difficult to tell which two will be in the starting 11 on Saturday but on the positive side, Moyes will be just as confused. It’s fantastic to have 4 such top quality players vying for places in our attack. They all have so much quality that you could almost draw any two of their names out of a hat and be confident that they will win you the game.

Even so, we will all have our preferences and opinions but the real question is not who we prefer but who we think Rafa will pick? In my view, I think Fowler will be one of the starters. Like it or not, we all know Rafa tends to prefer to rest players after international games so with Fowler being the only one of them not away on international duty, I think Rafa will give him the nod.

Much as I would love to see him play 90 minutes, I think Kuyt might be on the bench tomorrow. The reason for this is simply that I believe with all of his experience playing against PSV in Holland, he must surely be a certain starter for our midweek CL encounter with them and Rafa may well save his legs for that one.

So that brings us to Bellamy and Crouch. Bellamy played a few of our preseason games upfront with Fowler and there were some signs of a developing understanding between but despite this I would think he will go for Crouch. Crouch is the man in form and I think you’ve just got to play him but besides this, he and Fowler played upfront together last season to good effect. So I think those two will start but the other two will make an appearance later in the game.

Obviously this is pure guesswork on my part and it’s only my opinion of what I think Rafa might do. If it were up to me I’d play all four of them from the start and blow the blueshite away. I know this would leave gaps in other areas but fuck it, its only Everton!

Let me know your thoughts in the comments section below.

Coming tomorrow: How to win the Merseyside derby!