Midweek Preview: Can Wolves shock Liverpool, Man Utd's striking woes and can Man City and Leicester get back on track?
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What are the key matchups in this week's Premier League fixtures?
Hello and welcome to the Sky Sports weekend preview. Make that midweek preview because the Premier League football keeps coming just as we like it. A full schedule across Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday to get stuck into. And joining me, Kate Balaga, are two of Sky Sports.com's sharpest football brains, Adam Bate and Nick Wright. Guys, welcome. Hello.
Hello.
Good weekend, Nick?
Yeah, yeah, good weekend, thanks. I was at the Emirates on Saturday for Arsenal and Sheffield United, albeit in a different end of the ground to UK.
Yes, indeed. I very much enjoyed my trip to the Emirates, close to an excellent pylon, and deserve a decoy, I think.
Yeah, I think Sheffield United deserve something, for sure.
Adam, I hear you made a Cristiano Ronaldo pilgrimage.
Yeah, I've had a week in Madeira, a bit of winter sun. I saw Maritimo versus Vittoria, which was nil-nil. A bit of Marcus Edwards action. And then, yeah, I went to the CR7 Museum, which was a huge disappointment. I don't want to block my copy, but with the Madeira tourist board. But it just wasn't what I thought it would be like at all.
Tell me you saw that Ronaldo statue. The statue was there, but they've improved it.
But it was just... I thought there'd be, like, some sort of... It wasn't very hard, was it, to be fair?
No.
LAUGHTER
Yeah, it was just a trophy dump, really. I was hoping to get his life story or something, but it was just that the 2012 Zoo Magazine Award was next to a picture room with Nelson Mandela, which I thought was a bit incongruous. That was all right.
I'd love to linger on that story, Adam, but we've got loads to talk about. But before we look ahead, let's reflect briefly on Sunday's game at Anfield. Liverpool, of course, took another big step towards the title with that 2-0 win over Man Utd. 16 points clear, the fans are finally singing about winning the league, Salah's got his top off, Alisson's knee sliding. How significant did this one feel? Did it play out as you expected?
To me, it's easy to say afterwards, but I suppose it did. The more I thought about it, the more I thought that... It was kind of what you would expect where Liverpool did dominate. They threatened to absolutely hammer United, but it just didn't quite work out that way. And it's been that way a few times, actually, at Anfield this season. There's been games where you thought it was going to be four or five nil. It was actually close against Tottenham twice, home and away. I went to the Leicester game and the Wolves game where they were still in it late on. But yeah, United stayed in the game, which was about all you would expect them to do. But they just didn't. I mean, Solskjaer said that there were big chances.
Were there big chances, really? I'd say Pereira and maybe Martial had the shot over the bar. But really, I mean, it was a fair result and the title's going to Anfield, isn't it?
Yeah, I mean, I think you're right in saying that Liverpool should have had it more comfortable. You know, they had chances to make the result a lot more convincing than it was. But I think it really encapsulated what makes them such a formidable opponent, really. You know, first of all, you had the opening goal. scored by Van Dijk, obviously, which showed their threat from set pieces. Liverpool have scored more goals from set pieces since the start of last season than any other Premier League side. They've scored more headed goals as well. So Klopp has really kind of weaponised those situations as well as everything else. And then after that, they obviously showed that defensive resilience that we've seen so many times recently, haven't we?
As you mentioned, I was at the Brighton game at Anfield where they were really kind of They had to show a lot of steel in that game. And then at the end of it, you know, even in the very closing stages of the game, when it's been an intense game, they still have that kind of counter-attacking threat as well. You know, Alisson could easily have just kept hold of that ball and wound the clock down, but instead they go for the second goal.
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