20 hours Ago
Facing one of the biggest tests of their Premier League title credentials left on the calendar, runaway leaders Liverpool can inflict even more misery on Manchester City in Sunday's headline act at the Etihad Stadium. Arne Slot 's men may only have a five-point lead at the top of the table by the time they kick off in Manchester, as Arsenal can reduce their deficit to the Reds by besting West Ham United in their London derby on Saturday afternoon. Liverpool passed up the chance to go 10 points clear as they drew 2-2 with Aston Villa in midweek, but they could still take more positives than Man City, whose Champions League journey came to a premature end with a 6-3 knockout round playoff aggregate defeat to Real Madrid.
However, Pep Guardiola 's men ripped Newcastle United to shreds last time out in the Premier League, storming to a 4-0 win thanks in no small part to an Omar Marmoush treble, and ahead of Sunday's titanic tussle with Liverpool, Sports Mole takes a closer look at the head-to-head meetings between the two clubs. Previous meetings: 217 Liverpool wins: 109 Draws: 58 Man City wins: 60 From 217 previous battles between Liverpool and Manchester City, the Reds - who undoubtedly boast the more esteemed history - lead the head-to-head tally with 109 wins compared to 60 for the boys in blue, while another 58 contests have ended level. What may prove to be one of Liverpool's most critical wins over Man City arrived in December 2024, as Cody Gakpo and Mohamed Salah 's goals earned the Reds a deserved 2-0 win and took them 11 points clear of the Citizens at the top of the Premier League table .
Meanwhile, the most recent of those 58 draws came at Anfield back in March 2024, as a slick John Stones opener was cancelled out by an Alexis Mac Allister spot kick, although the Reds felt that they should have had another penalty in the dying embers for Jeremy Doku 's flying kick on the Argentine. Earlier in the 2023-24 season, Erling Haaland opened the scoring for the reigning champions at the Etihad, but Trent Alexander-Arnold found the bottom corner to restore parity in the dying embers before irking the home crowd with a shushing celebration. Alexander-Arnold's antics were not the sole reason for Citizens fan fury that day, though, as Pep Guardiola's side had a Ruben Dias strike ruled out for Manuel Akanji 's perceived foul on Alisson Becker and lost their two-game winning sequence versus the Reds in the process.
Man City had earned a pair of Etihad successes over Liverpool in 2022-23 - a 3-2 EFL Cup success and 4-1 Premier League battering - but an Anfield encounter in October 2022 went the Reds' way thanks to Salah's solitary goal. That triumph was not without a financial penalty for Jurgen Klopp , though, as the German gave the linesman an earful and took a £30,000 hit from the FA, and earlier meetings in 2022 saw the Reds prevail in the Community Shield and FA Cup semi-finals following a 2-2 Etihad draw in the Premier League. Owing to the low-scoring draw in March 2024 and December triumph, Liverpool have only been beaten one of their last 22 Premier League home matches against the Citizens, and while that did come as recently as February 2021 - a 4-1 embarrassment - there were no fans present at Anfield that day.
Furthermore, only two of the last 32 battles between Liverpool and Man City in the top flight have seen the away team come up trumps - the other being Liverpool's identical win at the Etihad in 2015 - which was Klopp's first meeting with the Citizens as Reds head coach. However, the German's departure from Liverpool at the end of the 2023-24 season means that his epic Premier League rivalry with Guardiola is now closed, and he could not prevent the Catalonian coach from winning four top-flight titles in a row before taking his leave..
