Liverpool miss an opportunity but make a title statement

If Jurgen Klopp and Pep Guardiola really have just met for the very last time in the Premier League their farewell fixture has left an incredible legacy; not just the memory of a game that summed up everything that is beguiling about both managers and their rivalry but also the promise of the most exciting title race of all time.

As Klopp’s dynamic, thrilling, heavy metal football ripped City to shreds in the second half, the atmosphere inside Anfield was so guttural, so all-consuming, that it was hard to remember that City’s calm, methodical and incisive game had dominated the first.

The contrast in styles, which has made Liverpool the most difficult fixture for Guardiola over a period of many years, was a football fan’s dream, and so was the result. It means that just one point separates Arsenal, Liverpool and City at the top of the table – and so even if these two managers will not meet again, this breathless fixture has set up a very special end to the 2023-24 season.

Who on earth would want to predict the outcome given the way this epic encounter ebbed and flowed, with the Kop bellowing Liverpool into wave after wave of second-half attacks, having seen Alexix MacAllister’s penalty equalise John Stone’s first-half opener?

Arsenal, who remain top of the table on goal difference, may well feel they were the winners on a day when Klopp and Guardiola couldn’t be separated, no matter how many blows they took. But there were also ominous signs for the Gunners that Liverpool have an extra edge to them right now. Chance after chance came and went with City, who lost goalkeeper Ederson to injury giving away the penalty from Nathan Ake’s woeful back-pass, somehow hanging on. But even then the visitors managed two gilt-edged