Man City vs. Liverpool
Venue: Etihad Stadium
Kick off: 5:30PM
The standout Premier League fixture of gameweek eight sees Manchester City welcome champions Liverpool to the Etihad Stadium in a battle between the top two from the past two seasons.
Man City go into this showdown sitting 10th whereas Liverpool have reassumed their position at the top of the table, but only five points separate the two sides and Man City also boast a game in hand, so victory today would see them move within striking distance of their title rivals.
The unpredictable nature of the 2020-21 season so far means that this is not quite the top-two battle we have become accustomed to seeing between these two sides in recent years, but they remain the favourites for the Premier League title and, even at this stage of the campaign, today’s match could prove to be important in the race.
Victory for Liverpool would take them eight points clear of the team they usurped as champions last season – a significant gap to make up on a team as consistent as the Reds even with a large portion of the campaign still to play.
By contrast, a home win would make it advantage Man City; they would move to within two points of Jurgen Klopp’s side with a game in hand – not bad considering they have suffered such an uncharacteristically inconsistent start to the season.
Dropped points at Leeds United and West Ham United, as well as their chastening 5-2 home defeat to Leicester City, stand out as poor results, but Liverpool have not been immune to such setbacks either – notably their 7-2 defeat to Aston Villa.
Both teams do seem to be hitting their strides now, though, and those improvements have both stemmed from tightening things up at the back – for Man City that followed the arrival of Ruben Dias, and oddly enough for Liverpool it has followed the loss of Virgil van Dijk.
Man City are unbeaten in eight games across all competitions and have won their last three without conceding, most recently cruising past Olympiacos in the Champions League on Tuesday night.
It is the first time since September of last year that Man City have kept three consecutive clean sheets, while since their 5-2 defeat to Leicester they have only conceded three times in their eight outings.
The flip side of that appears to have been less attacking threat; Man City have only scored nine times in their six league games so far this season, which is their lowest goals-per-game ratio in a campaign since their takeover in 2008.
Indeed, the Citizens have scored exactly once in each of their last four Premier League matches – they last went five consecutive games without netting more than once back in March 2009.
That will come as welcome news to a Liverpool side that has shipped 15 goals already this term – as many as they conceded in their first 26 league games last season and the most they have conceded at this stage of a campaign since 1964-65.
Pep Guardiola will point to the fact that he has been without a recognised centre-forward for much of the season so far and, while Sergio Aguero remains absent for this match, Gabriel Jesus is now back and made an immediate return to the scoresheet off the bench in midweek.
Surprisingly for a team of their quality, Man City are yet to win back-to-back league games this season, but they could achieve that this weekend following their 1-0 win at Sheffield United last Saturday.
Tests do not come much bigger than Liverpool right now, of course, but Man City have an incredible record against reigning champions, winning nine of their last 10 Premier League meetings with the title holders. That said, they have not won any of the last 11 matches in which they have met Liverpool as the champions.
Klopp once again labelled a trip to the Etihad Stadium as one of the biggest tests in football during his pre-match press conference and, while Leicester humiliated Sunday’s hosts there in September, that is Man City’s only home defeat since December 7, during which time they have won 11 games and scored 38 goals.
Liverpool were on the end of four of those on their last visit, although that did come just days after being crowned champions for the first time in 30 years and the visitors will be expected to put up a much sterner fight this time around.
Concerns over how the Reds would cope without Van Dijk have been eased by a run of five successive wins across all competitions, including back-to-back come-from-behind triumphs over Sheffield United and West Ham United in the league.
Liverpool have now won a league-high 28 points from losing positions since the start of last season and could win three consecutive Premier League games after conceding the opening goal for the first time ever today.
Of course, Klopp would much rather his side get their noses in front first and keep it that way, but he will also be aware that his patched-up defence, which has seen Nat Phillips and Rhys Williams utilised at centre-back since Fabinho joined Van Dijk on the injured list, will rarely come up against a bigger test than Man City away.
Man City possible XI: Ederson, Walker, Dias, Laporte, Cancelo, De Bruyne, Rodri, Gundogan, Mahrez, Jesus, Sterling.
Liverpool possible XI: Alisson, Alexander-Arnold, Matip, Gomez, Robertson, Henderson, Wijnaldum, Salah, Firmino, Mane, Jota.
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