Liverpool 4-3 Manchester City: 5 Talking Points

#4 Liverpool's brilliant midfield performance

The German held Liverpool's midfield together

Games of this stature are mostly decided by the men at the centre of the park. In one corner of the ring, we had the world beaters - the trio of Fernandinho, Kevin De Bruyne and Ilkay Gundogan; a more than an able deputy for the missing David Silva. On the other, we had the boxers in red, the inconsistent yet eye-catching trio of Emre Can, Gini Wijnaldum and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain.

City's midfielders/boxers must have thought that this would be just another day in the office for them. They could not have been more wrong. Their opponents not only hit them where it hurts but punched them incessantly with jab after jab to the ribs which made sure of a knockout at the end.

Enough with the wordplay.

The trio of Can, Wijnaldum, and Chamberlain were unstoppable on the night. Aggressive, winning back possession in a jiffy, circulating the ball well and winning the majority of the duels between the two sides.

Can was brilliant with his interceptions, Wijnaldum retained the ball with perfection and Chamberlain was the link which made Liverpool attack with impact. On the other hand, Fernandinho had a shocker of a game. Gundogan was just about decent on the night whereas De Bruyne was fighting a lone battle.

Jurgen Klopp's strategy of pressing from the midfield and dominating the centre with numbers paid off with all three of his midfielders working in tandem with great result. As for City, they finally met their match today and sadly, could not impress in their toughest bout till date.

.@Alex_OxChambo: MotM vs Manchester City @LFC pic.twitter.com/Vi9cWuKiN5

— WhoScored.com (@WhoScored) January 14, 2018