Man City aim to close the gap on Arsenal at the summit against Liverpool

Liverpool welcome Manchester City to Anfield for Sunday’s Premier League blockbuster contest.

The Reds claimed a comfortable 4-1 victory over Newcastle United last time out in the Premier League.

Man City secured their spot in the Carabao Cup final by beating Newcastle 3-1 (5-1 on aggregate) in the second leg of the semifinal on Wednesday.

However, Pep Guardiola’s side were held to a 2-2 draw at Tottenham Hotspur in their last Premier League outing.

Match preview

Liverpool have lost just one of their last 22 Premier League home games against Manchester City (W14 D7), with that defeat coming the only time they hosted them as reigning champions (1-4 in February 2021).

Following their 3-0 win at the Etihad in November, Manchester City are looking to complete their first league double over Liverpool since 1936/37, which was also the last time they won consecutive league games against them.

The Reds lost 3-0 in the reverse fixture against City; the last team to beat them twice to nil in the same Premier League campaign was West Ham United in 2015/16.

Only Liverpool (9) and Manchester United (7) have won more away games against reigning Premier League champions than Manchester City (6), with the Citizens winning five of their last six visits (L1).

From MD6 to MD12 this season, Liverpool lost more Premier League games than any other club (P7 W1 L6); since MD13, no side has lost fewer games than the Reds (P12 W5 D6 L1).

The Citizens are the only Premier League side in 2026 so far who have not conceded a single goal in the first half of a match, scoring six times themselves. However, they are also the only side who haven’t scored a second-half goal yet, conceding six goals.

Man City’s Erling Haaland has failed to score in all three of his Premier League away games against Liverpool. Anfield is one of just two grounds he’s played at but not scored in the competition, along with Sunderland’s Stadium of Light (1 app).

Hugo Ekitiké has scored or assisted every 112 minutes in the Premier League this season (10 goals, 2 assists in 1,342 minutes), the best ratio by a Liverpool player in their first season at the club since Mohamed Salah in 2017/18 (32 goals, 10 assists – one every 70 minutes).

Team news

Liverpool

Joe Gomez, Jeremie Frimpong, Conor Bradley, Alexander Isak and Giovanni Leoni are sidelined with injuries.

Manchester City

Bernardo Silva picked up a knock in the Spurs draw and is a doubt for the trip to Merseyside.

However, John Stones, Jeremy Doku, Mateo Kovacic, Josko Gvardiol and Savinho are all unavailable due to injuries.

Predicted line-ups

Liverpool: Alisson, Dominik Szoboszlai, Ibrahima Konaté, Virgil van Dijk, Milos Kerkez, Ryan Gravenberch, Alexis Mac Allister, Mohamed Salah, Florian Wirtz, Cody Gakpo, Hugo Ekitiké.

Manchester City: Gianluigi Donnarumma, Matheus Nunes, Abdukodir Khusanov, Marc Guéhi, Nico O’Reilly, Rodri, Tijjani Reijnders, Phil Foden, Rayan Cherki, Antoine Semenyo, Erling Haaland.