Man City 3-0 Liverpool (Haaland 29′, Gonzalez 45’+3, Doku 63′)
ETIHAD STADIUM — Liverpool are the reason Pep Guardiola is still here, 1,000 games in. They keep him young.
Had Liverpool not given the Catalan what he craves the most – a challenge polar opposite to his Johan Cruyff-inspired footballing ideology – Guardiola would have gone after the 2023 treble, the ultimate high to end upon.
Knowing when to go separates the very good from the best. Arsene Wenger got it badly wrong, Sir Alex Ferguson just right. Guardiola had appeared to fall into Wenger’s trap of sticking around too long.
Guardiola had to adapt after losing the title to Arne Slot's Liverpool (Photo: Getty)
Guardiola had to adapt after losing the title to Arne Slot’s Liverpool (Photo: Getty)
Last season, the traditional Pep blueprint firmly became yesterday’s news. The best teams, champions Liverpool, even upstarts like Bournemouth, played high-octane, transitional football. Fewer passes from front to back had sent tiki-taka into early retirement.
One of the biggest misconceptions in world football, however, is that Guardiola is of the Ruben Amorim school of thought – my way, my methods, or the highway.
No coach in history has adapted his approach more often than the Manchester City boss. And it is this otherworldly psychological flexibility that ensured his side, at the expense of free-spending champions Liverpool, will provide Arsenal with their biggest challenge this season.
Both teams, at various points in this modern City-Liverpool rivalry that Guardiola believes is akin to El Clasico due to the standard on show, have been able to humiliate their new foes with equal regularity.
What City did to Liverpool at the Etihad on Sunday was one of those occasions.
But not as we think we know it. The quality came in individual moments rather than a team blowing their counterparts away, from the type of players who would stick out like a sore thumb in a Pep coaching manual.
"The finish is absolutely devastating!" 👏
Micah Richards and Roy Keane analyse Jeremy Doku's goal against Liverpool 👇 pic.twitter.com/W4C1DcgOJa
— Sky Sports Premier League (@SkySportsPL) November 9, 2025
Much has been made of City’s over-reliance on Erling Haaland. City’s next top goalscorer is Maxime Esteve, a Burnley player with two own-goals. But what is a striker to do if it isn’t just to put the ball in the back of the net?
Anti-Pep it may be, but Haaland isn’t one goal away from becoming the next Premier League 100-club inductee in lightning-quick time by accident.
City are now direct, unashamedly so. The whole team operates this way, not just their strike focal point. Jeremy Doku’s dizzying display against Liverpool the case in point.
Conor Bradley may have had Vinicius Junior’s number, again, in midweek, but he had no answer to the Belgium international’s dancing feet at the Etihad. Doku has often had the beating of his man, but the end product has eluded him.
Doku was City's star of the show on Sunday (Photo: Getty)
Doku was City’s star of the show on Sunday (Photo: Getty)
Discovery of that missing piece to his game played a major part in Liverpool’s downfall. Doku completed seven take-ons in 70 minutes – more than Mohamed Salah has mustered all season – but that is nothing revolutionary. His phenomenal strike to seal City’s victory, however, was.
Eyebrows were raised when Doku arrived. This wasn’t a Pep player – a traditional winger who relishes beating his man and not passing sideways. If Jack Grealish’s maverick instincts were stifled, how could Doku thrive?
Traditional wingers are part of the plan, now. Just as an out-and-out striker is. Just as an old-school goalkeeper is. Keepers playing out from the back is equally as prevalent in the Premier League as it is on Hackney Marshes. At the highest level, however, times have changed, and high-pressing teams are causing a rethink.
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So what does Guardiola do? He sells Ederson, the best there has ever been with the ball at his feet, and brings in Gianluigi Donnarumma, a replacement purely based on his shot-stopping ability.
There are still elements of what got Guardiola to where he is today around the place. Haaland’s opener that set City on their way to victory touched every player in blue before the Norse goalscoring god headed home. Old habits die hard.
But it is everything else, adaptations whether completely innovative or recycling in-vogue traditions, that stands Guardiola above the rest and ensures one of his many coaching protégés best not offer too many chances in the coming months.