Sadio Mane and Erling Haaland transfers mean Man City vs Liverpool rivalry has reached new era

As the Premier League title race turned into the final straight last season, both Pep Guardiola and Jurgen Klopp were on the same page.

Manchester City held a narrow lead at the top of the table, with Liverpool hot on their heels. Both arguably deserved to win the title, but only one would lift the trophy. Guardiola and Klopp must have been sick of repeating themselves when insisting that they had to assume their rival would win every game, so any slip up would cost the title.

Guardiola and Klopp could confidently say that because they know the other's team better than anyone else. They've come face-to-face in four competitions for the past five years, and so little separates them. Now, though, there is a new factor in this modern rivalry: unpredictability.

Since Guardiola arrived at City in 2016, with Klopp already in place at Anfield, seven of the first nine meetings between the Blues and Liverpool ended in a victory for either team. In the following eight meetings, there have been four draws as both squads and coaching teams have grown in quality and have devised effective methods to stop the other.

Even the four wins for either side since 2019 have had extenuating circumstances. City's 3-1 defeat at Anfield that year was at the height of their injury woes in the season Liverpool raced to the title, and the 4-0 win for City at the Etihad came with nothing to play for, as Liverpool had just sealed their first Premier League title, achieving their main goal for the season.

The following season, City's 4-1 win at Anfield came behind closed doors and with a Liverpool injury crisis hampering Klopp's selection. And last season's FA Cup semi-final saw a full-strength Liverpool side ease to victory over a second-string City