PEP’S HEROES
Super Sane stuns Klopp to bring title race alive
PEP GUARDIOLA’S Manchester City breathed life into the title race last night as they inflicted Liverpool’s first defeat of the Premier League season.
City’s win cut Liverpool’s lead at the top to four points and captain Vincent Kompany roared: ‘It came from our guts, a desire you can’t describe.’
Leroy Sane cracked home the second-half clincher as Guardiola got the better of Jurgen Klopp on English soil at the fifth attempt. Sergio Aguero had put City ahead with his 250th career league goal in the Premier League.
Liverpool got back into the game when Roberto Firmino dived to head home from close range in the 64th minute.
HE DOES leave you guessing, Pep Guardiola. And, occasionally, he even leaves you scratching your head. Not many will have foreseen this plan, leaving Kyle Walker watching for a third game running on Manchester City’s biggest night of their title defence.
A huge call for Guardiola, the City manager who spent the eve of this clash dismissively battening down the hatches when some questioned his team’s recent defensive record.
City have now not kept a clean sheet in any of their past 11 matches, missing Fernandinho for much of that run but also seemingly bewildered and offering more chances in each game.
Last night that was not the case, just undone by a diagonal ball that Walker’s deputy, Danilo, shrunk beneath. One lapse in concentration is all that matters in matches like this, as Guardiola pointed out to his players in the days beforehand.
‘Yes, we were a machine defensively,’ Guardiola said, eyes rolling. ‘We are an incredible team defensively, the only team that can stop Liverpool.’
Unless he was making an exceptionally thinly-veiled point, he was forgetting that City are still the only team to shut out Liverpool this season — in the goalless draw at Anfield in October.
Then it was settled, with Walker a mainstay and Benjamin Mendy fit. Now Walker finds himself on the bench and Mendy on the treatment table. The former was the only player Guardiola blanked after defeat by Crystal Palace and he has not surfaced since.
Walker’s stay on the naughty step meant the athleticism of Danilo was the alternative and, until Liverpool’s equaliser, he coped well. Tottenham sources predicted Walker would have a spell struggling when he moved to City in 2017 but few saw his demise coming after three mistakes against a team battling relegation.
The lack of back-up has been laid bare with Fabian Delph out suspended. Leicester City’s Ben Chilwell is a target and would offer energy as well as steel. Aymeric Laporte, on the left last night, has the latter in abundance, making an early statement by pressing against Mo Salah on halfway.
It meant John Stones was partnered with Vincent Kompany, who was monstrous. Kompany is often saved for big occasions. ‘The best games you will have in your career,’ the Belgian said. ‘You have to want to play these.’
The central defenders were desperate to defend. A goal-line clearance by Stones, saving Ederson from an own goal by 11mm, was breathtaking.
But City’s back four were edgy on the ball and it is no coincidence that the ball ended up in Alisson’s net just 20 seconds after Kompany had played out from the back with purpose for the first time shortly before the break. Kompany — the man who initially held reservations about Guardiola’s style of play.