Pep thwarted, but City still look in ominous mood
THE WORDS came tumbling from Pep Guardiola’s lips. Breathless, relentless, staccato, just like his team’s passing. Sometimes, after a mild disappointment like this, the Manchester City manager over-compensates and now, as his players sat deflated in their changing room, he sang their praises to the heavens.
‘They feel “Oh, God, we had the chances to do it”,’ Guardiola said. ‘They feel a little bit sad in the locker room, but I’m incredibly pleased with the performance. It’s a pity, but I said to them: “You’re not going to win the Premier League today and you’re not going to lose it today, either”.’
City should have won. They had the better chances. Jeremy Doku served up a moving feast of crosses from the left and they had a goal ruled out for a foul on Alisson that barely was. But they could not quite free themselves from Liverpool’s grip.
In a game played in a flat atmosphere on a Saturday lunchtime, with players tired after an international break, it was hard not to feel that City had missed an opportunity to put some distance between themselves and the chasing pack.
For all Guardiola’s praise, it was an afternoon of lost chances for the champions, including the chance to break a record that has stood for 131 years. City had not lost or drawn a match at the Etihad since New Year’s Eve 2022 and a win over Liverpool would have been their 24th successive home victory in all competitions, beating Sunderland’s record from back in 1892.
Another record did fall, though. Erling Haaland’s goal, his first against Liverpool, was his 50th in 48 league games for City, beating the previous Premier League record of fastest to a half century, held by Andrew Cole. It took Cole 65 games to reach the mark. Haaland obliterated it. He is a phenomenon.
But despite Haaland always lurking, Doku always threatening and Liverpool not getting to grips with Bernardo Silva, Jurgen Klopp’s side, the only disruptors of City’s hegemony in the past six years, were always defiant. They never lacked belief and even if Trent Alexander-Arnold’s late equaliser was against the run of play, it was hardly out of nowhere.
‘We passed a test today,’ Klopp said, referencing the fact that this side is still in the early stages of its rebuild, still getting to know each other and learning to function as a unit. ‘It was a test but I’m not sure it was the test, if that makes sense.’
For all Liverpool’s resistance, the result did little to dispel the notion that City will win their fourth title in a row. The strong belief is that the longer the season goes on, and as players like Kevin De Bruyne and John Stones come back into the team, they will only get stronger and stronger.
But Liverpool, who are doing a fine job for a team in transition, restated their credentials to be the closest challengers with this point. Arsenal may still be the team to push City closest, but Liverpool are working towards a new rhythm with a new side. They are reaching for consistency, but cannot quite locate it yet.
City were missing Jack Grealish, who was left out of the squad through illness, and Stones only made the bench as he inches his way back from injury. But they still dominated the opening stages of a game pitting first against second.
Liverpool suffered their first alarm ten minutes into the match when Alisson, who had an unusually shaky game, sidefooted the ball straight to Phil Foden as he tried to break through City’s press. Foden was only 15 yards out and made space for a shot, but hit it straight at the relieved goalkeeper.
Liverpool forged their first chance of the game five minutes later when Joel Matip burst out of defence and laid the ball to Mo Salah on the right. He cut inside and curled over a cross which Darwin Nunez glanced goalwards, but Ederson kept it out with a fine, flying right-handed save.
Nunez ought to have scored again a minute later when Dominik Szoboszlai threaded a ball through the City defence to set him free. But Nunez took one touch too many and allowed Ruben Dias to tackle him and clear the danger.
Liverpool soon regretted that profligacy. Just before the half hour Alisson, exuding nerves and uncertainty, miscued a kick out of his hands and sliced it straight to Nathan Ake midway inside the Liverpool half.
Ake had been preferred to Josko Gvardiol and now he showed why. He took the ball down perfectly, slalomed between two Liverpool players and drilled a pass into Haaland. He took it on the half turn and even though he scuffed his left footed shot, Alisson could not redeem himself. He got a hand to the shot, but could only push it into the corner.
Brentford stand alone now as the only team in the English top flight to have prevented Haaland from scoring against them. ‘Only 50?’ Guardiola said with a smile when he was told of the mark his forward had reached.
But City gave Liverpool glimpses of hope. They were occasionally careless in possession and Guardiola sank to his haunches several times on the touchline, fearing Liverpool would punish them.
Nunez, who was closer to the anonymous side of his playing persona than the explosive version Liverpool were hoping for, twice chose to pass when he might have shot, his confidence damaged by his earlier miss.
When City pressed for a second, they looked more likely to score. Alisson had to dive at full-stretch to push a low shot from Foden round the post at the end of a move that started with Ederson drilling a pinpoint pass out of his area to Silva.
City should have gone two ahead six minutes after half-time from another move that originated with Ederson. This time, Haaland controlled the keeper’s throw out and played it to Julian Alvarez.
Alvarez swept it out wide to Doku, who went past Alexis Mac Allister as if he was not there and then laid the ball back into the path of Alvarez. He was ten yards out, but lifted his shot high over the bar.
Liverpool had another escape a few minutes later. Alisson fumbled a corner from Alvarez under pressure from Manuel Akanji and Dias prodded it into the net. Contact between the Liverpool goalkeeper and Akanji appeared to
be minimal, but referee Chris Kavanagh blew for an infringement and VAR upheld his decision.
Then, against the run of play, Liverpool equalised. It was an innocuous build-up. Salah retrieved an overhit cross on the right, turned and fed the ball into the feet of Alexander-Arnold. He took one touch on the run and then lashed the ball across Ederson and into the corner of the net.
In the last minute of added time, Haaland rose majestically in the box to meet an inswinging corner from Alvarez and flicked the ball on. It seemed to be speeding into the far corner, but somehow slid by.
On the touchline, Guardiola went through a thousand agonies, dancing the dance of a tortured soul, rubbing his face with his hands, bemoaning his team’s mercifulness and not knowing whether to laugh or cry. He became briefly involved in a spat with Nunez at the end before Klopp intervened to play peacemaker and the anger passed.
A point might have been a missed opportunity, but if City did not win the league yesterday, it was hard not to feel it took them another small step towards a fourth straight title.