Jamie Carragher believes Manchester City and Liverpool have a rivalry that is one-of-a-kind as far as the Premier League is concerned.
While it is widely acknowledged that Pep Guardiola and Jurgen Klopp have elevated the standard of the league, while providing box-office games for years, one aspect of their rivalry is often slated.
And that simply is how there seems to be no bad blood between them as well as both the clubs in question; unlike when say, Jose Mourinho’s Chelsea and Arsene Wenger’s Arsenal locked horns.
Ahead of Manchester City’s 1-1 draw against Liverpool, Klopp admitted that Guardiola is the best manager in the world, which tells a story.
Jamie Carragher explains why Manchester City and Liverpool are unlike any other rivalry in Premier League history
In November, Guardiola also praised the German for pushing him to the limit and as a result, improving him as a manager.
After City’s 2-2 draw with Liverpool, Kevin De Bruyne admitted [via ESPN UK] that he sees Virgil van Dijk quite regularly as their children go to the same school as each other.
The pair were even spotted on holiday in the summer [via ESPN FC].
Despite the friendly nature of the rivalry between Manchester City and Liverpool, Jamie Carragher has pinpointed why it has been unique in comparison to the rest in Premier League history.
“Liverpool and Man City have been the two best teams in Europe for a good few years of this rivalry, we’ve never had that before in the Premier League, fact!”, he wrote on X.
However, Gary Neville was far from happy about Jamie Carragher’s statement that the two clubs have shared the best rivalry the Premier League has ever seen.
“[Jamie] Carragher’s statement that Liverpool and Manchester City over the last six years is the greatest rivalry is offensive. From ’98 to 2004, Arsenal won three titles, Manchester United won four, it was blood, thunder, quality, everything you’d want in a rivalry”, he said on Sky Sports.
“Over the last six years, Liverpool have won one title, it’s been an absolute demolition!”
Jamie Carragher replied, “I said that, off the pitch, there’s was a bigger rivalry, they all didn’t like each other, he was running down the tunnel trying to get away from [Patrick] Vieira.”
“But in terms of quality, I think these are the better games. 100 per cent, they never, ever disappoint.”
Jamie Carragher has a point
In our view, whether Manchester City and Liverpool have had the best rivalry in the Premier League era is debatable but Jamie Carragher has a point about it being rare that both sides have been the best in Europe over the past few years.
Of course, other teams like Real Madrid, Bayern Munich and Chelsea have won the Champions League but at times, the winner of Europe’s elite competition might not necessarily have been the best team in the continent.
Such is certainly the case with Chelsea, when they won the tournament in 2021 and Real Madrid, when they were crowned champions in 2022.
But from 2018 until 2024, City and Liverpool have arguably been the gold standard for European football, which perhaps cannot be said when Manchester United and Arsenal, for instance, were going toe-to-toe with each other, as Gary Neville pointed out.
