Liverpool dominates Man U in Premier League
Jose Mourinho chose his words carefully, and they proved to be as candid as they were concerning for Manchester United as its worst start to a Premier League season hit a new low.
“Liverpool,” Mourinho said, “is a better team than us.”
Liverpool’s 3-1 win over its great rival on Sunday was confirmation of that — although it still needed two strokes of luck to underline the gulf that has quickly grown between English soccer’s two grandest clubs.
Xherdan Shaqiri came off the bench and scored goals from deflected shots in the 73rd and 80th minutes to finally give Liverpool daylight in a match it dominated from the start at Anfield. In total, Liverpool had 36 shots to United’s six.
The gap between Liverpool in first place and United in sixth place extended to 19 points after just 17 games.
Elsewhere: Lionel Messi scored a hat trick and set up two more goals to lead Barcelona to a 5-0 victory at Levante, restoring the defending champion’s three-point lead of the Spanish league. Messi netted his 18th, 19th and 20th goals in all competitions this season after setting up Luis Suarez to get Barcelona rolling at the Ciutat de Valencia Stadium. … Arkadiusz Milik scored a stoppage-time goal to snatch a 1-0 win for Napoli in the Serie A and prevent his team’s title hopes diminishing even further. Napoli remained second in the Italian league, eight points behind Juventus and six above third-placed Inter after both clubs won on Saturday. … Germany forward Timo Werner again scored twice to help Leipzig consolidate fourth place in the Bundesliga with a 4-1 home win over Mainz. … Lille showed the attacking flair and resilient qualities befitting a side challenging for second place, winning 3-2 at Nimes despite playing most of the French league match with 10 men.
ETC.
Boxing: Canelo Alvarez threw a Garden party Saturday night. A short and powerful fiesta. Alvarez landed dozens of body punches, knocking down Rocky Fielding four times and stopping him in the third round to earn his third weight class title, taking the WBA super middleweight belt.
Coming off his close decision against Gennady Golovkin three months ago to take the WBA and WBC middleweight titles, Alvarez could hear chants of “Canelo! Canelo!” long before he entered the Madison Square Garden ring for the first time. Throughout a lengthy undercard, it was clear who the sellout crowd of 20,112 came to see and cheer.
Baseball: A person familiar with the negotiations says the New York Mets have agreed to a twoyear, $19.5 million deal with free agent catcher Wilson Ramos. The deal likely signals an end to the Mets’ pursuit of Marlins catcher J.T. Realmuto.
Winter sports: Marcel Hirscher dominated to extend his record by winning the Alta Badia giant slalom in La Villa, Italy, for a sixth year in a row and reclaimed the overall World Cup lead. Adding to his first-run advantage, Hirscher finished a massive 2.53 seconds ahead of Thomas Fanara of France, who moved up from 14th after the opening leg. Alexis Pinturault, another Frenchman, finished third, 2.69 behind.