City Watch: Late drama at Anfield

Manchester City faced one of their toughest challenges, other than Tottenham Hotspur away of course, on Sunday. 

A trip to Anfield to play the current Premier League holders has always been a tough challenge, a place the Blues have failed to win at for 23 years with fans; I don’t include the Covid season with empty stadiums, football is always better with supporters.

Before I talk about the trip to Merseyside, because there’s so much to unpack, City also faced Newcastle United in the second leg of their Carabao Cup semi final. 

I won’t talk about the game too much, mostly because I won’t have enough space to talk about Liverpool otherwise, and I think we all know how much space that’s going to take.

However, the players came out of the blocks swinging, scoring in the first ten minutes and catching the Geordies on pretty much every counter attack following with their high press. The game ended up being 3-1, meaning an aggregate score of 5-1, meaning City will play Arsenal in the final.

I’ll unpack the impacts of that closer to the time, but that is going to be one incredible game, especially if the Premier League title race is still on. Now let’s talk Liverpool. I wasn’t able to attend on Sunday unfortunately, however, you can imagine how much I regret that choice.

Again, City came out of the blocks quickly, dominating the first half and getting the large share of great chances. 

Despite a 0-0 score at half time, I was confident for the second period, knowing a loss would’ve left us nine points behind the Gunners and probably ended the title race.

Second half performances have not been our strong spot this season, especially in 2026, Spurs away still haunting us, and this, yet again, played out to be our downfall once again. 

Liverpool were much better in the second half, with some great chances and controversial decisions dominating the match. 

There was debate as to whether Marc Guehi, who’d impressed once again, should’ve been sent off for a tug on Salah just outside the box for being the last man. For me, Dias was covering, so that would’ve been an incredibly harsh sending off, I’m sure the Reds would disagree with me.

However, just a few minutes later, Liverpool got a free kick in a similar position to the one they had against Arsenal early on in the season. Dominik Szoboszlai unleashed one of the best free kicks I’ve ever seen, completely unsaveable as Donnarumma just stood planted to put the Reds 1-0 up with just 15 to go.

Once again, it looked like Anfield was going to foil us. 

However, that goal lit the touchpaper to one of the craziest endings to a game I’ve ever witnessed. In the 84th minute, Bernardo Silva scored from close range from a Haaland flick on to level up the score, but we all knew that wasn’t going to be enough… three points were crucial.

Enter Matheus Nunes, who has been unbelievable this season, making that right back position his own, even more impressive considering he’s a midfielder. 

The Portuguese international made a fantastic run into the box touching the ball past Allison, who wiped him out, giving the Blues a 93rd minute penalty and the chance to claim their first league double over Liverpool in 89 years.

As Erling Haaland stood over the ball ready to take his penalty, I thought about the fact there are just two grounds he has played in where he hasn’t scored, Anfield being one of the, and the fact that one kick could genuinely decide our whole Premier League season.

Ice in his veins, though, he scored, giving us a 2-1 lead with just a few minutes of injury time remaining, and finally ending our Anfield curse. 

Talk about heroics with last minute goals, Liverpool had a fabulous chance with less than a minute remaining. Deflected off Dias, it looked destined for the top corner, but Donnarumma made a world class save to deny them once again. 

Outfield players get the accolades for last minute winners and game saving goals, that was the goalkeepers, he won us that game.

Possibly one of the most controversial and ridiculous Premier League moments then unfolded. 

Alisson went up for a Liverpool corner, leaving their goal open. Somehow, City got the ball out, leaving Rayan Cherki and Erling Haaland with just Szoboszlai in front of them. 

Cherki took a shot from his own half that was on target but didn’t have quite as much power as he would’ve wanted.

Haaland chased down the ball to ensure it went in, Szoboszlai then pulled Erling back to get in front of him, with the Norwegian returning the favour which allowed the ball to roll into the net.

It looked to be done and dusted, but VAR got involved and disallowed the goal, sending off Szoboszlai for the initial foul. I understand that rules need to be followed, and there’s no cancel out rule in place because they both fouled each other, however, I don’t think there was anyone, maybe other than Arsenal fans, who wanted that goal to be ruled out, we were robbed of a historic moment.

Regardless, the game was seen out from there, and City claimed a massive win at Anfield, just about keeping themselves in the title race and six points off the Gunners. 

City now play Fulham on Wednesday night which we will know the result of by the time this column is released. If the Blues win, they will be just three points off the top with Arsenal playing on Thursday night… suddenly this title race seems back on!