Manchester City travel to Liverpool on Sunday with the usual narrative flipped on its head. This time it is the reigning champions who must find a way through the league’s best defence.
But there is a route to victory for Guardiola, providing he embraces the end-to-end wildness into which this fixture so often descends.
Six of the eight Premier League goals Liverpool have conceded this season were scored in transition – just after the ball has been turned over. Five of those eight goals were created by running directly at, or past, the Reds’ full-backs.
That should be City’s target.
Guardiola should field his fastest ball-carrying wingers and encourage quick distribution into their feet when possession turns over.
Jeremy Doku and Savinho, if hit early, can cause damage running at Liverpool’s right-back (whomever it is) and left-back Andrew Robertson – undone already this season by Callum Hudson-Odoi, Kaoru Mitoma, Tyler Dibling and Bukayo Saka.
There is an even better way to expose this vulnerability; slot Kevin de Bruyne into the right-half space, the column of the pitch that runs between opposition left-back and centre-back.
As he comes back to fitness, De Bruyne is just the kind of player needed to take advantage of space behind Liverpool’s left winger, which is precisely what he did the last time Man City beat the Reds.
In the above graphic from the 4-1 victory in April 2023, City’s number 17 De Bruyne lurked out right and combined with Riyad Mahrez to punishing effect. His pass map below also illustrates a greater concentration of contributions from that side of the pitch.
Better still for City, Liverpool have conceded three goals from through balls played in behind by a central midfielder. Something De Bruyne could do for Erling Haaland.
There is a path to a City win, but only if Guardiola breaks tradition and goes all-in on a transitional game, something Liverpool head coach Arne Slot has begun to pull back on from predecessor Jurgen Klopp’s all-action style.
