Sparkling Man City Turn It On For Pep And Plunge Liverpool Into Crisis

The concept of statement wins is a nebulous one in football.

Significant as a result may appear on the day, its impact can ultimately only be measured depending on how the remainder of the season unfolds.

With seven months still left in the Premier League’s campaign, Manchester City’s dismantling of Liverpool on Sunday afternoon may yet account for nothing.

And yet, while its long-term ramifications remain to be seen, its immediate impact was seismic.

City’s 3-0 thrashing of the reigning Premier League champions consolidated them as Arsenal’s main challengers for the title, closing the gap to four points after the Gunners were held to a 2-2 draw at Sunderland on Saturday.

If the scoreline at the Etihad was resounding, City’s performance was even more so. In Pep Guardiola’s 1,000th match as a manager and 550th in charge of City, his side swarmed all over Liverpool, slicing through the visitors at will.

Erling Haaland missed a penalty, but soon made amends by opening the scoring following a flowing move that embodied Guardiola’s football in its purest form.

City touched the ball 18 times before Matheus Nunes’ cross found Haaland in the box, the Norwegian towering over Ibrahima Konate to direct his header past Liverpool keeper Giorgi Mamardashvili to register his 99th Premier League goal.

Nico Gonzalez then added a second on the stroke of halftime shortly after Virgil Van Djik had what would have been Liverpool equaliser ruled out for offside.

The outstanding Jeremy Doku iced the game in the second half, capping a superb individual performance during which he ran Conor Bradley ragged.

“He’s demanding himself to be better, he listens, and has special attributes of dribbling,” Guardiola said of Doku.

“He was aggressive with and without the ball. We tried to help him and he played an outstanding game.”

City have already lost three times this season but were minutes away from beating Arsenal at the Emirates Stadium in September, before Gabriel Martinelli’s late equaliser.

They now shape up to be the Gunners’ most credible challengers for the Premier League title.

Asked whether Arsenal’s draw against Sunderland had provided City with extra motivation, Guardiola replied: “I said to the players not to do it because yesterday Arsenal didn’t win.

“Do it because we believe in ourselves that we can play against the champions of England and show them we are ready to be there with them this season.

“Today we proved it – especially in the first half.”

City were at their brilliant best in the first 45 minutes, combining the pace of Haaland, Dorgu and Rayan Cherki with the sublime ball control that has been a signature of Guardiola’s best sides.

Are Liverpool out of the Premier League title race?

In stark contrast, Liverpool were abject as they slumped to a fifth defeat in 11 league fixtures and a seventh loss in the past 10 games in all competitions.

This was Liverpool’s heaviest defeat in the Premier League under Arne Slot and the first time in over a year they had failed to score in a league game.

Having won their first five league fixtures this season, the Reds have lost five of their next sixth.

Only once in the Premier League had the reigning champions lost more games at this stage, when Chelsea lost six times in the opening three months of the 2015-16 season, a run which ultimately led to Jose Mourinho’s sacking.

Slot has now become the first Liverpool manager to lose four consecutive Premier League games on the road since 2012. Last season, he had to wait until April to lose his first game away from home in the league.

Defeat against City left Liverpool in eighth place, eight points behind Arsenal and the inescapable feeling their title defence is as good as over.

“The last thing I should think about now is the title race,” Slot admitted.

“The reality is we are eighth.”

Liverpool left-back Andy Robertson conceded the reigning Premier League champions had left themselves a “huge uphill battle” to defend their title.

“I don’t think you can talk about the title this early on in the season, regardless of what position you’re in,” he said.

“But you need to then consistently start winning games again for that to even come into question.”

Consecutive wins over Aston Villa and Real Madrid over the past week proved to be a false dawn for Slot, as his side came back to earth with a resounding thud in Manchester.

The control they had on games last season has all but disappeared along with the patterns of play that made Liverpool spectacularly efficient going forward.

After scoring 29 goals and registering 18 assists last season, Mohamed Salah has looked curiously out of sync this season. Sunday was the first time in five years that the Egyptian did not score nor register an assist against City, with Nico O’Reilly regularly getting the better of him.

It’s “crisis time for Liverpool”

As for Liverpool’s record spending spree in the summer, it is hard to dispel the feeling that splurging £446.5m ($598m) on players has set Slot’s team back.

Alexander Isak, who arrived from Newcastle on transfer deadline day for a British record £125m ($167m), was an unused substitute on Sunday.

Florian Wirtz, who joined from Bayer Leverkusen for £116.5m ($156m), was a peripheral figure once again and Hugo Ekitike, a £79m ($106m) signing from Eintracht Frankfurt, was also anonymous.

But if Liverpool’s lack of fluidity in the final third of the pitch is an issue, of far greater concern to Slot will be his team’s soft underbelly.

On Sunday, City tore through Liverpool’s midfield at will to isolate their back four, which has now conceded 17 times – the second-most of any team in the top-10 of the Premier League table.

To put the figure into context, Arsenal and City have conceded five and eight goals respectively and Liverpool had allowed just three goals at the corresponding stage of the season a year ago.

As Gary Neville noted during the game on Sky Sports, Liverpool looked leggy and sluggish against City, devoid of energy and self-belief.

Speaking on the same broadcast, Roy Keane went even further.

“I think it is crisis time for Liverpool,” the former Manchester United captain said.

“I thought Liverpool looked like a really weak team today. There was a lack of intensity, a lack of energy. The subs, when they came on, looked really soft.

“I think it is a crisis for Liverpool.”

Guardiola will never forget his 1,000th game in charge and chances are Slot won’t either, but for all the wrong reasons.