Premier League and Champions League challengers Liverpool offer hope to struggling Manchester United

I was at Anfield last Friday and Old Trafford last Sunday. Comparisons were unavoidable and not just the obvious ones on the pitch. Liverpool are 26 points ahead of Manchester United, their widest gap since 1990, the last time Liverpool won the league. Liverpool have scored 20 more league goals than United this season and conceded 31 fewer. Given the size of the gulf, the mood is very different at each club – but there are more nuanced differences between the way these two giants of football go about business. Outside Anfield, a local singer sang the “Allez, Allez, Allez” anthem which has accompanied this Liverpool side for a year on a loop from a stage behind the Kop. When singer Jamie Webster sang it in Michigan before a pre-season game against Man United, he was joined by a surprise guest, a smiling Jurgen Klopp. In the same American state, a miserable Jose Mourinho refused attempts to communicate with fans and even went as far as to say that he wouldn’t pay money to watch his team. At Anfield on Friday night, tourists wearing half Liverpool-half Huddersfield Town scarves took video of the performance while locals stayed in the pub. Memorial gates and statues of former legends have grown around these two iconic grounds in the last 25 years making them attractions on a non-match day. Outside Old Trafford on Sunday before the latest disappointing result, eight stunning Russian air stewardesses from one of United’s principal sponsors, stood in heels and red uniforms smiling for photos with tourists. A few days earlier at the Manchester derby, it had been a sunglasses manufacturer. United currently have more success in attracting sponsors than Liverpool, but it will be harder to maintain that. It’s not a permanent situation, though. United finished above Liverpool only last season, but nobody would pretend their current team comes close to Klopp’s exciting side. It was that side which finally put paid to Jose Mourinho’s reign in December. Despite the misery and poor football, I’d defended Mourinho’s right to carry on doing his job and be judged after three years as he’d asked – until two weeks before he was sacked. Eventually Ole Gunnar Solskjaer took the wheel in some style as he oversaw a 19-game unbeaten run. Now, the team have won two from their last 10 games. It’s as bad as anything supporters saw under Mourinho or Louis van Gaal before him. Manchester United and Liverpool, two of the biggest football clubs in the world, come from cities which are only 28 miles apart. That’s going to be the points difference between the two clubs this season given current form, a situation which causes deep concern for Manchester’s Reds. Both have American owners. Liverpool’s are effectively a hedge fund who’ve unlocked great potential in a huge football club they bought for a knockdown price. They’ve expanded the stadium, brought in the right manager and finally found the right strategy in recruitment. They buy emerging but not yet fully formed talents with experience at less wealthy European clubs – Luis Suarez from Ajax, Philippe Coutinho from Inter, Roberto Firmino from Hoffenheim, Mohamed Salah from Roma, Naby Keita from RB Leipzig. They’re bold too – they have two excellent full-backs in Andrew Robertson, a 25-year-old signed from Hull and home-grown Trent Alexander Arnold. They don’t operate at the top end of the market, they’ve had to sell their best players and their wages don’t compare with United’s. Virgil van Dijk, their best player and the best defender in the league, would earn a lot more at Old Trafford. Like Sadio Mane, he came from Southampton. None were huge names when they came. ⚽️ #UCL #MUFC #JLingz pic.twitter.com/71xNtEhC32 — Jesse Lingard (@JesseLingard) April 9, 2019 The people who operate the social media accounts for United’s players make a lot more noise than Liverpool’s players. Liverpool’s win football matches instead. Hindsight makes judgements easier and there were no complaints when the club signed Alexis Sanchez, but United’s recruitment policy looks mangled in comparison, the result of several managers with different philosophies and ideas. Solskjaer uses different systems which take getting used to. United lack Liverpool’s coherence, confidence, form and aggression. They’re also lacking soul at present. Perhaps Solskjaer will bring that back, but it’ll take time. 1️⃣ Messi Robertson 2️⃣ ______ ______ 3️⃣ ______ ______ Three key battles to anticipate on Wednesday night at the Camp Nou ⬇️https://t.co/CGrcB0L9FI — Liverpool FC (@LFC) April 29, 2019 Liverpool fans are buzzing with anticipation about their Champions League semi-final trip to Barcelona, a tie they’re confident of winning. For years, that was United, where the end of April meant huge football matches or “squeaky bum time” in Alex Ferguson’s parlance. United fans can’t wait for the season to end. They were out of the League Cup in September, the FA Cup in March and the Champions League in April. They were never in the title race. That yawning chasm between Liverpool and United won’t always be there. United were the top dogs between 1991 and 2013. But currently United look as washed up as Liverpool once did.

Premier League and Champions League challengers Liverpool offer hope to struggling Manchester United

.css-1mniedq{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;}Anfield side have developed a successful model under Jurgen Klopp and American owners, in stark contrast to Old Trafford Virgil van Dijk a prime example of getting recruitment process right

Anfield side have developed a successful model under Jurgen Klopp and American owners, in stark contrast to Old Trafford

Virgil van Dijk a prime example of getting recruitment process right