Liverpool stretch lead in title race with win over Manchester City

Posted Monday, November 11, 2019 by PA

Liverpool took a huge advantage in the Premier League title race as their 3-1 win opened up a nine-point gap over opponents Manchester City.

Leicester, eight points behind, are now their closest challengers after City’s miserable run at Anfield – one win in 29 visits – continued in a match which left Pep Guardiola raging at some controversial VAR calls.

Fabinho could not have timed his first goal since December any better with the sixth-minute opener, with City still arguing for a handball by Trent Alexander-Arnold in the other penalty area, and Mohamed Salah and Sadio Mane put the game out of sight before a late consolation for Bernardo Silva.

THIS TEAM! ❤️ #YNWA pic.twitter.com/phizw4Yh3U
— Liverpool FC (@LFC) November 10, 2019

Liverpool have now faced all their big-six rivals plus Leicester while City have plenty of work left to do, having only met the Reds and Tottenham up to this point.

In a truly bizarre opening 20 minutes City dominated to the extent their hosts barely had chance to string more than a couple of passes together – yet when they did it was so devastatingly effective it made any possession statistics irrelevant.

Straight from kick-off City sent the ball deep into enemy territory, pressurising so much in there that their opponents did not complete a pass and conceded a corner in the opening 60 seconds.

That pattern was replicated for the first quarter of the game but the more City pushed the their suspect defence was left exposed to the tranche of space opening up around them.