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Chasing down a Champions League spot, Liverpool hosted Manchester City at Anfield, who themselves are attempting to chase down Arsenal in the title race.
Arne Slot kept with the same eleven that beat Newcastle last week.
After making changes for the League Cup semi-final in mid-week, Pep Guardiola returned largely to the side that drew with Tottenham Hotspur last week, with Omar Marmoush replacing Rayan Cherki the sole change.
Liverpool had some success pressing very early on. Hugo Ekitiké would push up onto Abdukodir Khusanov, and Mohamed Salah onto Marc Guéhi, while Florian Wirtz and Alexis Mac Allister would stick to any midfielders dropping back, cutting off the short options.
City generally looked to play around this by knocking the ball out to Rayan Aït-Nouri on the left, however Dominik Szoboszlai would step up to meet him so he couldn’t easily control the ball.
They would also try hitting it long to Erling Haaland, yet Liverpool would usually win the second balls.
It didn’t take City long to start playing around this pressure though. When Gianluigi Donnarumma stopped trying to play over the top and instead held onto the ball, a Liverpool player would leave his man to close him down, leaving a free City player to receive the ball and play out if they could find the angle to get it to him.
Being able to play past this initial line allowed City to take advantage of Liverpool’s weaknesses further up the pitch. Liverpool’s midfielders tend to follow around their opposite number, which denies those players space, but can see large gaps open up between them.
Marmoush dropped off into this space to receive the ball on several occasions, yet there were also moments were City players simply strolled through it with the ball.
City also aimed to target Szoboszlai at right-back, having Marmoush and Aït-Nouri double up on him. If Szoboszlai followed Marmoush then this would leave space for Aït-Nouri to receive the ball on the overlap, but if he backed off to track Aït-Nouri then Marmoush would have space to pick up the ball.
Szoboszlai’s predicament could be neatly contrasted with Milos Kerkez, who was free to stick tight to Antoine Semenyo without having to worry about leaving space.
The result was that City had Liverpool pinned back defending their own box for large portions of the first half.
In possession, Liverpool mainly passed the ball slowly from side to side along the backline, looking to bait City into pressing. From there they would then hit the ball long for their three forwards running in behind the City defence. With City pulled forward to press and their defensive line pushed back due to the Liverpool runners, this also created space for Florian Wirtz to potentially get the ball between the lines too.
For the most part these direct balls were easily dealt with by City though, and worse still City managed to catch Liverpool in their own half several times as they slowly passed the ball around the defence.
Liverpool played much better in the second half however, making more of an effort to play out rather than kicking long. Bernardo Silva would often push forward to join Marmoush and Haaland defensively, so in order to not leave space behind him in midfield, Semenyo would tuck inside into the middle instead. The knock-on effect of this was that Kerkez would have space on the left though, and so Liverpool were able to easily progress the ball into attack.
Liverpool were also doubling up on Nico O’Reilly on the right. With Marmoush stepping up onto Ibrahima Konaté, it was often left to O’Reilly to move out to meet Szoboszlai. Ryan Gravenberch began to move into this area too though, leaving O’Reilly caught between the two of them, meaning one could often go free and progress the ball.
It was Liverpool that would finally open the scoring with twenty minutes to go, as Szoboszlai scored a screamer of a free-kick from distance.
Having taken the lead they set about defending it, ditching their intense approach to instead drop back and defend deep.
Having been on the ropes for most of the second half, City were now handed back control and sought to break Liverpool down.
It took them a little over ten minutes to do so. With Liverpool pinned back in their defensive third, Cherki crossed the ball into the box. It deflected off of Mac Allister, but Haaland reacted fastest, nodding it on for Silva to finish. There was no real clever move by City to create the chance, but with Liverpool allowing them so close to their goal, it didn’t exactly have to travel far to end up in the net.
City would then take the lead in injury time. Kerkez moved wide to meet Cherki, leaving a large gap between him and Virgil van Dijk that Matheus Nunes took advantage of, running forward. Neither Curtis Jones or Mac Allister tracked the run, so Alisson Becker sprinted out to confront him, fouling Nunes. Haaland converted the resulting penalty.
It was another loss for a Liverpool side that has just six league wins since September.
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