The Premier League’s long summer gap finally starts closing on Saturday 25 July, when Liverpool open their US tour against Sunderland at Geodis Park in Nashville — the first competitive-ish sighting of both squads before the 2026/27 season kicks off on 22 August.
The storylines
Tour openers are about answers. Which new signings start? Who’s been moved into a new role over the summer? Which academy names make the tour squad cut? Expect two different Liverpool XIs across the halves, heavy minutes for the youngsters, and the first genuine look at how the manager wants to set up for the new campaign.
For Sunderland, an all-Premier League friendly on neutral soil is a level up from the usual pre-season diet, and a useful measuring stick — with the added novelty that this is one of the very few times these two north-of-England rivals will ever meet in Tennessee.
The venue
Geodis Park is Nashville SC’s 30,000-seat football-specific stadium — the biggest soccer-specific ground in the US — and it’s the first stop on a genuinely big-stadium tour: Liverpool go on to Wrexham at Yankee Stadium on 29 July and Leeds at Chicago’s Soldier Field on 2 August.
When to tune in
The match is Saturday 25 July with a US evening kick-off — we’ll pin the exact UK time here once confirmed by the club (expect late evening/night UK). There’s no regular TV coverage for pre-season friendlies: officially it’s LFCTV GO and Sunderland’s club stream. The free stream linked above carries the match without a subscription.
Fair warning for the schedulers: the 25th is stacked — Anthony Joshua fights in Jeddah that evening and the Hungarian GP runs all weekend. Guides to everything are on this site.