Manchester City vs. Liverpool: *Bumper* Post-Match Analysis

Better than the World Cup final

Paul Tomkins, Andrew Beasley, Daniel Rhodes and other TTT regulars will give their thoughts on the match for 24 hours after the game, so the article received via email is unlikely to be the final version. There's statistics from the match and videos too.

Post-Match Thoughts

Paul Tomkins

Jürgen Klopp's Liverpool are rarely any good after long breaks, but even though it was starting to find some rhythm before the World Cup, this team definitely needed a long break.

It may mean longer to get back up to speed, as I noted before the World Cup, but these players have played a ton of football since the summer of 2021. As such, a game like this was a great training session, with Liverpool also not needing the gruelling grind of extra cup games, with 22 league matches and the Champions League still to play.

I would say maybe only four of the starting XI (and the first sub, Nat Phillips) would be part of the Reds' best team, and the defence and keeper were missing four of the five. As such, it was never going to be a dominant display.

But rather than rush players back, as Man City arguably did with their World Cup players who got through to the knockouts, Liverpool have to be a bit more careful (and even then, James Milner picked up an injury). Liverpool normally take 2-3 games to get back up to speed, because it's all about the rhythm and intensity.

It wasn't a particularly balanced Liverpool XI either, but the younger players will benefit from a trip away to face Manchester City – who were fielding their new signing, David Coote, who didn't book City's players for kicking Liverpool players off the ball (twice!). Then again, he didn't think the Jordan Pickford assault on Virgil Van Dijk was a foul, as the VAR that day, so what do you expect? When Rodri was violent again in the second half, and when Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain was fouled in the box, Coote was as dreadful as ever.

City could bring on £100m subs, as they do, and whilst they were better on the night, they should have been, being at home with a squad that expensive (and as Andrew notes below, two of their starting players combined, after inflation, cost more than the entire Liverpool starting XI).

The longer the game went on, the sharper Liverpool looked, with kids giving way to senior reserves. It was fast and frantic, and as an exercise in getting back up to speed, it should serve the team well. And there were quite a few positives, in amongst some poor defending.

The second half of my comments and those of the others follow for subscribers only.