Liverpool have overcome another hurdle on their way towards the 2024/25 Premier League title, defeating Manchester City away from home by two goals to nil this past weekend.
Arne Slot’s Reds took an early lead through Mohamed Salah from a set-piece in the 14th minute before Dominik Szoboszlai doubled the lead in the 37th minute of the game.
Game state allowed Liverpool to take a defence-first approach for the majority of the game, which worked a treat in silencing Man City at the Etihad.
This tactical analysis piece aims to shed some light on Liverpool’s defensive tactics from Sunday’s fixture.
We’ll break down some key features of the Reds’ defensive performance to keep a clean sheet away to Pep Guardiola’s side and explain why those elements worked so well in this game.
Manchester City Vs Liverpool Lineups & Formations
Firstly, let’s acquaint ourselves with the lineups for both teams.
The home side lined up in a 4-1-4-1 shape with Ederson starting in goal behind Rico Lewis at right-back, Abdukodir Khusanov at right centre-back, Nathan Aké at left centre-back and Joško Gvardiol at left-back.
Nico González occupied the holding midfield position behind Kevin De Bruyne (right) and Omar Marmoush (left) in central midfield.
Sávio started on the right wing opposite Jérémy Doku on the left, with Phil Foden playing a ‘false 9’ role up front in Erling Haaland’s absence.
City made four substitutions over the course of the match.
Firstly, James McAtee came on for De Bruyne in the 66th-minute.
This preceded a triple substitution 11 minutes later, which saw Ilkay Gündogan, Rúben Dias, and Mateo Kovačić replace Marmoush, Aké and González, respectively.
On the other side, Arne Slot’s formation set the Reds up in a 4-4-2 shape with Alisson between the sticks, Trent Alexander-Arnold at right-back, Ibrahima Konaté at right centre-back, Virgil van Dijk at left centre-back and Andy Robertson playing left-back.
From right to left, Liverpool’s midfield four were Mo Salah, Ryan Gravenberch, Alexis Mac Allister, and Luis Díaz.
Curtis Jones and Szoboszlai occupied the two centre-forward positions.
Slot made one more substitution than Guardiola before the final whistle had blown.
Firstly, in the 73rd minute, Wataru Endo and Kostas Tsimikas were introduced in place of Jones and Robertson, respectively.
Six minutes later, Cody Gakpo came on for Díaz before the Merseyside club made a final double substitution in the first minute of stoppage time as Harvey Elliott and Jarell Quansah replaced Salah and Alexander-Arnold, respectively.
Now, let’s get into the Man City vs Liverpool tactical analysis.
How Liverpool’s Centre-Backs Defended The Space In Front Of Them Vs Manchester City
Erling Haaland’s absence was a glaring one for Manchester City.
The Norwegian striker missed City’s last UEFA Champions League game of the season — a defeat to Real Madrid last week — and now, this Premier League clash with Liverpool.
City scored once against Real Madrid in a 3-1 loss and failed to hit the back of the net at home against Liverpool.
On analysing this game, it was apparent that City lacked the centre-forward presence and movement that Haaland normally brings to the table.
In his place, City relied on Foden, De Bruyne, and Marmoush—the centre-forward and the two more advanced central midfielders—to initially position themselves between and around Liverpool’s centre-backs.
Man City built up patiently from the back before those players dropped deeper into space behind the midfield but in front of the defence.
This can be an effective tactic, but any time City attempted to play through Liverpool’s defensive structure in this way, the Reds’ centre-backs would step out to aggressively close down the dropping receiver, limiting their time and space on the ball.
City also often lacked the penetrative runs in behind, targeting the space inevitably opened up in Liverpool’s defence by their centre-backs’ aggressive movement.
Thus, City failed to exploit a potential weakness in these aggressive defensive tactics from the centre-backs.
Let’s look at some examples of this defensive approach in action from Sunday’s game.
Konaté does well to quickly close down Foden, denying him the time and space to make his next move a truly impactful one on receiving in a potentially dangerous position in between the lines while Liverpool are defending in the high-block.
Our next image shows Van Dijk defending in a similar fashion against City’s false 9, but this time, the Reds operate in a mid-low block.
Liverpool got very vertically and horizontally compact when defending deeper, meaning full-backs and central midfielders were sometimes able to offer cover for their centre-backs when they stepped out to close down players between the lines as Van Dijk is here.
Still, we see that Van Dijk’s movement has created a big gap in the Reds’ defence which City will fail to exploit — a combined result of Liverpool’s effective defending here as well as City’s poor attacking.
Liverpool’s legendary Dutch centre-back did the same versus De Bruyne when the Belgian playmaker received in a space similar to Foden before but slightly more towards the wing.
This highlights how De Bruyne’s role was intended to work in this game and how Liverpool took the same approach against him as they did with Foden.
As De Bruyne receives it, he’s prevented from turning by Van Dijk, who closes him down aggressively from behind.
At the same time, two of Liverpool’s midfielders are naturally positioned close by to also apply some pressure to the midfielder.
Once more, we can see how a notable gap has opened in the Reds’ defence, yet City were unable to exploit it in part due to Liverpool’s defensive pressure.
How Liverpool’s Defence Defended The Space Behind Them Vs Manchester City
We’ve addressed how Liverpool’s backline protected the space in front of them in this game; now, we’ll focus on the space behind them, about which they also had to be concerned.
City attempted to exploit the space behind Liverpool’s backline on numerous occasions during this match, making long passes to players like Doku and Sávio, who have the pace to potentially hurt a team if they get on the ball with space to attack.
However, Arne Slot’s tactics were well prepared for this potential method of attack from Manchester City, and rarely, if at all, looked troubled by City’s approach.
Liverpool’s key to defending the space behind them was spotting the incoming long ball from Man City early and dropping back to give themselves some extra time and space to deal with the threat.
Before this image, Robertson had been a bit tighter to De Bruyne.
However, he spots the City ball carrier getting his head up and beginning to line up a long ball in behind Liverpool’s backline.
He potentially targets De Bruyne or Sávio —both on that wing—but more likely Sávio due to his pace advantage.
When he sees that, Robertson intelligently drops back off De Bruyne to get a head start on any City runner behind him, allowing him to cover both De Bruyne and Sávio more evenly.
Four seconds later, we rejoin the action with City having played a threatening long ball in behind Liverpool’s backline.
The long ball does, in the end, target Sávio.
Robertson’s preparation for the City attack, thanks to his head start on the City winger, allowed him to deal with the threat calmly.
Here, we see Liverpool’s centre-back duo dropping back in unison quite early to defend a similar threat, with Marmoush making the penetrating run in behind this time.
The centre-backs spot the danger and City’s probable method of attack early, beginning to drop off to protect the space behind them.
This works well, and, again, the Reds position themselves to thwart the danger quite calmly in the end.
How Liverpool’s Defenders Switched Off Marking Duties Between Them Vs Manchester City
Our final analysis section on Arne Slot’s defence tactics versus Manchester City focuses on how Liverpool’s defenders switched players off between them in relation to marking responsibilities, particularly in the mid-block or low-block phases.
Here, we join the Reds in the mid-block phase.
Firstly, in the top left, Kevin De Bruyne drops into some space between the lines, moving towards the ball-carrying centre-back and away from his marker Van Dijk.
Two seconds later, moving to the top right, we see this movement has been completed.
De Bruyne is now putting himself in Alexis Mac Allister’s zone, overloading that particular area with Foden already occupying the Reds midfielder.
In the bottom-left, we see how Foden now drops away from Mac Allister, forcing the midfielder into a decision about which player he will mark.
The midfielder focuses on the player in front of him, indicating to the centre-backs behind him with his hand that Foden is now free and needs picking up.
This hand signalling was a crucial aspect of Liverpool’s switching in marking duties here and was seen on numerous occasions, helping the Reds remain organised.
Van Dijk moves across to pick up Foden while Mac Allister begins marking De Bruyne.
Ultimately, despite De Bruyne and Foden’s movement, Liverpool’s combination of an extremely centrally compact defensive shape and diligent switching off in marking responsibilities prevented City from progressing out of their own half during this sequence and continuously stifled Guardiola’s side throughout the match.
Conclusion
All of Arne Slot’s defensive strategies analysed in this piece played a significant role in Liverpool’s clean sheet versus Manchester City at the Etihad on Sunday.
With just 33% possession, Liverpool were quite comfortable playing without the ball and, for the most part, had Pep Guardiola’s side fully under control — hence their two-goal win.
In his debut season, Arne Slot has already proven himself a master tactician capable of adjusting tactics on the fly, even against some of the best managers in the world like Guardiola.
