The traditional curtain raiser to the English league season- the Community Shield, takes place this weekend, with Pep Guardiola’s City taking on Jurgen Klopp’s Liverpool at the King Power Stadium. It is also one of the rare occasions where the game has not been held at Wembley, with the stadium being a host for the 2022 Women’s European Championships forcing a switch to the KP Stadium in Leicester.
The Foxes, winners of the trophy last season, will however not be present on home ground to defend their title as they failed to win either the Cup or the League in 21/22. Liverpool won the FA and the League Cups- both against Chelsea, and somewhat interestingly, both on penalties. City qualified for the game by virtue of their league triumph- the Reds tried their best to make it a treble and only fell two points short of their rivals in what was a title race for the ages.
Indeed, despite Man Utd, Arsenal and Chelsea’s spending in the current window, a quick look at the Premier League outrights again shows City and LFC to be main favourites for the title. The two teams have operated at a level different to the rest of their opponents in recent years, and we wouldn’t be surprised if 22/23 turns out to be a two-horse race again.
Liverpool will not have Diogo Jota available for this clash and are also sweating on the fitness of goalkeeper Alisson. The Reds have had some indifferent results in pre-season- they were beaten 4-0 by Man United in Bangkok for example, but it would perhaps be foolish to read too much into those games given that they are, for all intents and purposes, glorified friendlies.
New Uruguayan signing Darwin Nunez struggled against United, even missing an easy chance, but showed glimpses of his potential with a four-goal haul in their 5-0 thumping of Leipzig. The Uruguayan is expected to play a key role at Anfield this season, more so in the absence of Senegalese international Sadio Mane, who has left the Reds for a new challenge in the Bundesliga by signing for Bayern Munich.
At the other end, City have let both Gabriel Jesus and Oleksandr Zinchenko leave the club, but have perhaps landed the signing of the summer in the form of Erling Haaland, with the lanky forward expected to fill the big boots vacated by Sergio Aguero. The Norwegian was on target in City’s most recent friendly clash- a 1-0 win over Bayern, where the Bavarian giants failed to muster even a single shot on target.
What happened the last time the two teams met in the CS?
That was in the 2019 edition of the shield. The game ended in a 1-1 draw after normal time, with Joel Matip having cancelled out Raheem Sterling’s opener. The fixture went to penalties where Gini Wijnaldum’s missed spot kick proving vital as City edged the clash 5-4 in the shootout.