Liverpool 0-3 Manchester City: Haaland 65, Doku 68, Cherki 78
In the end Manchester City laughed last at Anfield. Or have they? Will something happen in the future and this victory over Liverpool turn out not to matter? How much longer can this uncertainty go on?
It was quite clear that, by the full time whistle, if courtesy of Ryan Gravenberch’s sending off, that City were the better team on the pitch.
But off the pitch there remains their 114-point guilty charge. It is ridiculous that this matter will continue to go unresolved in the near future and City continue to be allowed to play, despite being found guilty of the most extensive cheating scandal in world football. The Premier League is turning into a farce.
The Liverpool fans ensured that the City players and their travelling support knew exactly what they thought about the verdict. Anfield can be hostile when it needs to be and Liverpool supporters rose quite expectedly to the occasion. There were banners. Chants of We know what you are sounded across the stadium for much of the uneventful first half.
Liverpool were far from full strength here after injuries to Alexander Isak, Cody Gakpo and Dominik Szoboszlai during the international break. Andoni Iraola was forced to hand the 21-year-old Lewis Koumas his first start at the club up front, the youngster doing well with a scorching effort that Gianluigi Donnarumma had to parry shortly after the break.
The hosts nonetheless remained competitive until Gravenberch was sent off in the 62nd minute. The Liverpool midfielder received his second yellow card for catching Jeremy Doku as the winger attempted to launch a counterattack.
Erling Haaland capitalised three minutes later and finished from close range after Doku’s cross took a deflection. The game soon opened up and City scored twice more in ten minutes to put the tie to bed.
Doku doubled the lead when he fizzed inside from the left and curled into the top right corner. Then there was Rayan Cherki, who blitzed into the Liverpool area after some neat City interplay ended with Josko Gvardiol back-heeling the ball into his path. Cherki faked a shot to ease the sliding Jeremy Jacquet away before slipping the ball beneath Alisson.
