Grealish helps Manchester City crush Liverpool to keep pressure on Arsenal

Title race still firmly, exhilaratingly on: Manchester City required all three points to keep their breath hot on the necks of Arsenal and they did the business supremely in a second-half show of might.

Having fallen behind to Mohamed Salah’s smash-and-grab opener, Julián Álvarez equalised to make it 1-1 at the break. Then City showed why they are the champions of the past two seasons and the dominant, garlanded side of this era.

A first killer blow was administered seconds after the interval via the kind of fast break Liverpool had hit them with. Álvarez can take bouquets for helping to create Kevin De Bruyne’s strike, as the Argentinian’s crossfield ball sliced open Jürgen Klopp’s side and found the roving Riyad Mahrez along the right. He turned the ball across and the Belgian, so often City’s key man, finished.

A memorable day for Álvarez became even rosier when his shot was blocked by Trent Alexander-Arnold and Ilkay Gündogan hooked home. The 23-year-old was surely only in the XI due to Erling Haaland’s groin problem yet Pep Guardiola had answered perfectly the poser of what to do when your 42-goal man is ruled out: select a World Cup-winner who can slot straight into the side’s seamless groove and be the standout performer.

Gündogan’s finish had the stadium bouncing and Klopp fuming. Liverpool’s manager was yet again overseeing a defensive horror show so he responded with what felt like a farcical move, dragging off four players on 70 minutes: Salah (perhaps unfortunate to be removed), Diogo Jota, Harvey Elliott and Andrew Robertson, as Roberto Firmino, Darwin Núñez, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Kosta Tsimikas all entered.

When the outstanding Jack Grealish gave Alexander-Arnold the runaround – swapping passes with