Fear has become the manager’s defining principle and at Anfield a typically defensive substitution was the unravellingNine days before Christmas was not really so very long ago, yet it feels like a different world. Manchester City had just been held to a draw at home by West Brom that left them eighth in the Premier League table. Southampton were third. And Tottenham went to the league leaders, Liverpool, knowing that a win would put them top. In the confusing period between the second and third lockdowns, it seemed possible that this slog of a season might just provide an environment in which José Mourinho’s attritional style could thrive.Yet Spurs host Manchester United on Sunday afternoon having begun the weekend in...
A genuine aristocrat of European football, the striker’s final run at the club he has flourished at may well come from the fringesThe agony of choice. Manchester City started this game with a frontline of Riyadh Mahrez, Sergio Agüero and Gabriel Jesus: a move from zero No 9s to two of them, although Jesus moves in more mysterious ways than the average centre-forward.Midway though the second half this had switched to a fluid front four of – oh, let’s see – Jesus, Kevin De Bruyne, Raheem Sterling and Ferran Torres. By the end Phil Foden was hurtling though the centre forward position, legs whirring, the world’s most prodigiously gifted attacking afterthought. Related: Benjamin Mendy and Gabriel Jesus fire Manchester City...
A team built prudently to Jürgen Klopp’s designs and geared to thrive on fine margins have lacked wiggle room in adversityThe story of Liverpool FC’s wild, thrillingly committed Premier League collapse has been told mainly in numbers so far. And to good effect. Deprived of crowds, staging or a wider emotional palette, that basic outline – 38 points down on last year; 68 home games unbeaten versus six defeats in six – has captured the starkness of a complete sporting immolation. This is a train that has simply stopped.Better to burn out than fade away, and it has to be said no one has ever won and then lost the Premier League title quite like this. It is easy to...
First face second in the Manchester derby on Sunday – and yet has ever a game between the Premier League’s top two sides ever felt so essentially inessential? The look on Sir Alex Ferguson’s face was a curious mixture of disbelief, shock and amusement. “You can’t believe that scoreline,” he said. “First 45 minutes, we were outstanding. The sending off was a killer for us. And after that, we kept attacking. That’s the nature of Manchester United, fine. But it was crazy. Unbelievable.” And then, remarkably, he smiled. Because even though Manchester City had come to Old Trafford and dished out a 6-1 trouncing, Ferguson somehow sensed amid his disappointment that the fundamentals of his side would survive this single...
Ole Gunnar Solskjær isn’t just picking a more defensive team away from home – he’s picking a more effective one On the road with Manchester United: a journey in 19 acts. As with most road stories, the biggest question around United’s record unbeaten away run is whether, for all the fun, the jazz, the poetry, the roman candle pyrotechnics, it’s actually leading them anywhere.This is a bildungsroman that will head back to its start point once again on Sunday afternoon. It is almost exactly a year since United set off on their magic bus tour with a 2-0 victory at Stamford Bridge. Those 19 Premier League away matches without defeat have cut across two seasons, the mixed and varied delights...