Struggling Manchester United travel to the home of bitter rivals, Liverpool, this weekend desperate to avoid another humiliation but with all the signs pointing to a tough afternoon at Anfield. The Red Devils left Merseyside last season with their tails between their legs after a 7-0 drubbing, are facing a Liverpool team top of the Premier League and brimful of confidence
Forced to relive painful memories of last season’s seven-goal slaughter, Manchester United make a short trip to Merseyside to face Liverpool in front of an anticipated record-breaking Anfield crowd on Sunday.
As many as 57,000 fans are expected to saunter through the turnstiles to witness this weekend’s headline Premier League contest, where the two titans are both aiming to rectify some midweek mistakes.
Thanks to a successful test event on Monday, a portion of Liverpool’s Anfield Road Stand will officially open for business on Sunday – a month earlier than expected – where the hosts are hoping to welcome their highest amount of spectators in the Premier League era and their most since the days of Bill Shankly in 1973.
Barring the Merseyside derby perhaps, the Liverpool powers-that-be could arguably not have wished for a more mouthwatering battle to break their spectator record – especially if recent results against Man United are anything to go by – and Jurgen Klopp’s side head into Sunday’s momentous occasion atop their Premier League perch.
Klopp and 12.30pm kickoffs are hardly a marriage made in heaven, and the midday misery appeared set to continue when Jean-Philippe Mateta sent Crystal Palace ahead from the penalty spot last weekend, but Mohamed Salah’s 200th Reds goal and a fine Harvey Elliott winner saw Liverpool complete another trademark turnaround.
With Arsenal falling short against Aston Villa later in the day, Liverpool enter gameweek 17 with a one-point advantage over the Gunners and two-point cushion over the Lions – both of whom are in action at 2pm – so the Reds may have been bumped down to the bronze medal position by the time the first whistle blows at Anfield.
An experimental XI comprising fringe and academy players suffered a 2-1 Europa League loss to Union SG on Thursday, but that result paled into insignificance with a last-16 place already assured, and a seven-game Premier League winning run at home makes for incredibly pleasant reading for the Liverpool faithful, whose side have also scored at least twice in all of those triumphs.
Taking a leaf out of Liverpool’s attacking book would not go amiss for their under-performing visitors, who also fell to a one-goal European defeat in midweek, albeit a much more disheartening one as they were booted out of the continental conversation entirely.
Even a win over Bayern Munich on the final matchday in Champions League Group A would have been rendered inconsequential by Copenhagen’s beating of Galatasaray, but Erik ten Hag’s troops fell short in their bid for Europa League salvation, succumbing to a Kingsley Coman strike to finish bottom of the pile.
With no European football on the calendar for the first half of 2024, Ten Hag will be blessed with ample time to reverse his side’s horrendous domestic fortunes, as the downcast Red Devils were subjected to a cacophony of boos from fed up supporters in last weekend’s humiliating 3-0 Old Trafford loss to Bournemouth.
As a result, Man United enter the weekend sat five places and 10 points worse off than Liverpool in the Premier League rankings, and the Red Devils have gone over two years without winning away against a team in the top eight of the table; the Ole Gunnar Solskjaer-masterminded 3-0 success over Tottenham Hotspur in October 2021 was their last such triumph.
A penny for both Solskjaer and Ten Hag’s thoughts as Man United were blown to smithereens at Anfield in March, as Liverpool condemned the Red Devils to a 7-0 beatdown – the visitors’ heaviest Premier League defeat ever – and not since 2016 have Man United come away from the Reds’ turf with a Premier League win to shout about.
