Liverpool V City Is No Longer The Premier League’s Big Show: How Have The Mighty Fallen? | Jonathan Wilson

Great rivalries are ever much astir consciousness than astir numbers. There person been only 4 Premier League seasons successful which Manchester City and Liverpool person vanished successful nan apical 2 positions successful nan array (and 1 of those occasions was 2013-14 erstwhile nan managers were Manuel Pellegrini and Brendan Rodgers, which is not a duel anybody is penning books aliases making documentaries about).

Yet for astir of nan decade that Pep Guardiola has been astatine City, it has felt that English shot was defined by his struggle pinch Jürgen Klopp and Liverpool, and by a shape of nan crippled that developed arsenic each learned from nan other.

Klopp has gone now and cipher would beryllium amazed were Guardiola (and/or Arne Slot) to travel successful nan summer. The seasons erstwhile some clubs would soar past 90 points are past. They are successful transition, recrafting their squads for a caller property that is yet afloat to return shape, and nan rivalry is diminished arsenic a result. Liverpool are retired of nan title race, and conclusion astatine Anfield could successful effect return retired City arsenic well.

The rumor pinch nan Guardiola/Klopp gyration was possibly that it was excessively successful. Once everybody accepted its principles, and holding them, almost nary matter really efficiently you could execute them, was nary longer enough. There isn’t a squad successful nan Premier League now that isn’t astatine slightest comparatively adept astatine pressing, often not successful nan remorseless manner that became acquainted successful nan days of highest Klopp but successful short bursts successful circumstantial situations.

The thought of utilizing possession to create overloads is broadly accepted by everybody. Once a gyration has go nan position quo, though, it is nary longer a revolution. What comes adjacent is nan mobility cipher yet seems capable to answer. And what’s striking is that, while galore Premier League clubs person followed nan illustration of Mikel Arteta, looking to power and group pieces, neither City nor Liverpool have.

It’s conscionable complete a twelvemonth since Guardiola gave nan question and reply to TNT successful which he said modern shot was being played by Bournemouth, Brighton and Newcastle. That understandably drew nan headlines, fixed it seemed successful isolation to propose that Guardiola was saying nan crippled had go progressively astir ball-carrying alternatively than passing. Perhaps much telling, though, was what he said next.

Pep Guardiola has often had origin to beryllium upset this season, pinch his squad dropping points aft being successful nan lead. Photograph: Robbie Jay Barratt/AMA/Getty Images

“Today,” he went on, “modern shot is not positional, you person to thrust nan rhythm, it is unbelievable, and we could not, simply we could not because we did not person nan players … The teams that are playing erstwhile a week, it is different communicative and that doesn’t count, it counts erstwhile you are playing each 3 aliases 4 days.” (The pre-emptive drive-by connected this season’s Manchester United was presumably accidental).

This was not, successful different words, immoderate benignant of recantation of religion by Guardiola, nor immoderate benignant of admittance that his measurement of doing things was outmoded. Rather it was a applicable point, a nickname that nan modern almanac is excessively crowded to play nan measurement he utilized to, nan measurement he wants to. Guardiola has ever existed successful a authorities of perpetual evolution; his top spot has been his capacity to tweak, create and hone his style of play – but his astir caller adaptations person been forced connected him.

There is possibly nary greater illustration of that than nan signing of Erling Haaland, nan astir accepted of No 9s, whose reluctance to prosecute pinch midfield possession felt for illustration a deliberate effort by Guardiola to present a imaginative friction, to break up nan occasionally predictable patterns his shot tin create. Given that it brought nan treble, it tin beryllium said to person worked, but nan inclination of buying against type has continued, though it’s unclear whether that is nan activity of Guardiola aliases Hugo Viana, who replaced Txiki Begiristain arsenic sporting head past summer.

Gianluigi Donnarumma is simply a commanding beingness and an highly bully shot-stopper, but his comparative deficiency of expertise pinch his feet makes him an uncharacteristic Guardiola keeper. Rayan Cherki is technically gifted but he plays pinch a state that is antithetical to nan Guardiola desire for control. Rayan Aït-Nouri’s guardant surges whitethorn beryllium breathtaking but it’s difficult to ideate a little emblematic Guardiola full-back.

The constitution of nan squad implied a move to playing a much accepted style, and that has materialised to an extent. City have, unusually, won 4 games this play pinch little than 50% possession; successful nan tie astatine Arsenal they had conscionable 33% of nan ball. More recently, though, Guardiola’s broadside person returned to thing much familiar: since nan chaotic 5-4 triumph complete Fulham successful early December, City haven’t had little than 58% of nan shot successful immoderate convention game.

If that was intended to bring control, though, it has failed. City’s attempts to employment an offside trap, redoubled since nan presence of Pep Lijnders arsenic adjunct past summer, person amplified nan susceptibility to balls played successful down nan protect line. It’s not conscionable precocious risk, it’s besides a style that demands further beingness effort, an rumor that seems contrary to Guardiola’s protests astir fatigue and possibly explains why this City squad truthful often slice successful nan 2nd half of games.

Hugo Ekitike was signed successful nan summertime of 2025 erstwhile Liverpool needed midfield aliases protect reinforcements much urgently. Photograph: Adam Vaughan/EPA

The wide belief is of confusion, but Liverpool’s attempts to rejig their style person been conscionable arsenic muddled. It’s still not clear what imagination underlay past summer’s spree. There seems to person been a wide consciousness that it was amended to attraction connected much method players – and it astir apt is easier to bulk them up than to create accelerated feet successful beingness monsters. But, unless Liverpool are group connected pursuing Leeds and Nigeria by operating regularly pinch a beforehand pairing, it remains difficult to understand nan logic down signing 2 centre-forwards erstwhile location were specified evident deficiencies successful midfield and astatine nan back.

And truthful what was precocious nan showpiece crippled of English shot – think, possibly especially, of their 4 meetings successful 2017-18: a 5-0 triumph for City and a 4-3 triumph for Liverpool, followed by Liverpool’s 3-0 and 2-1 wins successful nan Champions League – has taken connected a different cast.

Two clubs who led nan world, not only successful position of results but successful really they played, now scratch astir successful nan post-consensus gloom, wondering what nan early whitethorn beryllium and really they mightiness lead it.