Man Utd vs Liverpool Preview & Prediction | 2024-25 English Premier League
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Sunday afternoon presents one of the standout games from anywhere in world football and a rivalry between two cities in the north west of England that will be built up endlessly by the media as Manchester United welcome Liverpool to Old Trafford.
KICK-OFF DATE/TIME: Sunday 1st September, 2024 - UK – 4:00pm / US ET – 11:00am / US PT – 8:00am
HOW TO WATCH ON TV: UK – Sky Sports / US – Not televised
HOW TO WATCH ONLINE: UK – Sky Go / US – Peacock, Fubo, Sling Blue & DirecTV Stream
MAN UTD PREVIEW: SAME OLD UNITED
It has been the first summer transfer window of the INEOS era and Manchester United have continued to spend large amounts of money on players from clubs that don’t want those players. On the pitch, Erik ten Hag’s football has often been quite similar throughout his just over two years in charge and little appears to have changed this summer.
Even when United play well, there is a general lack of clarity and cohesion that means they fail to blow teams away – as they have only ever done on a handful of occasions. Last weekend saw them suffer a defeat to Brighton and Hove Albion, again, by two goals to one at the AMEX Stadium with Joao Pedro scoring a 95th minute winning goal for the Seagulls.
LIVERPOOL PREVIEW: SLOT-BALL
The tedious term of ‘Slot-ball’ is already being used to describe back-to-back 2-0 victories against fairly generous opposition in Ipswich Town and Brentford. That said, there have been sustained periods within both matches in which the Reds have been genuinely impressive to watch and quite entertaining to watch, too.
Arne Slot’s reign at Anfield has begun comfortably and with comprehensive victories that cannot have too much analysis done on them given the small sample size. One interesting early trend would be their much-improved second-half performances and attacking efficiency with wearing down of the opposition and tactical tweaks having an impact.
MAN UTD TEAM NEWS: MOUNT OUT
Erik ten Hag has confirmed that, after making back-to-back starts this season, England international midfielder Mason Mount is now unavailable for this weekend after picking up a minor muscle injury.
As well as Mount, United are still dealing with injuries to Victor Lindelof, Leny Yoro, Tyrell Malacia, Luke Shaw and Rasmus Hojlund with new signing Manuel Ugarte not signing in time to be registered to play this weekend.
PREDICTED XI (4-2-3-1): Onana; Mazraoui, De Ligt, Martinez, Diogo Dalot; Casemiro, Mainoo; Diallo, Fernandes, Alejandro Garnacho; Rashford
UNAVAILABLE: Lindelof (Injured), Yoro (Injured), Malacia (Injured), Shaw (Injured), Mount (Injured), Hojlund (Injured)
QUESTIONABLE:
LIVERPOOL TEAM NEWS: CHIESA UNLIKELY FOR THIS ONE
Liverpool's new signing this week Federico Chiesa is unlikely to be involved in the Reds' squad as they travel to Manchester with the Italy international playing in his first training session on Friday and he is seeking to regain fitness.
Bar Chiesa, they are also sweating on the fitness of English midfielder Curtis Jones who is a big doubt and hasn't trained in the latter stages of this week.
PREDICTED XI (4-2-3-1): Alisson; Alexander-Arnold, Konate, Van Dijk, Robertson; Mac Allister, Gravenberch; Salah, Szoboszlai, Luis Diaz; Diogo Jota
UNAVAILABLE:
QUESTIONABLE: Jones (Injured), Chiesa (Injured)
MAN UTD VS LIVERPOOL PREDICTION
It is always one of the most eagerly awaited encounters in the Premier League and this one has the potential to send the hosts into yet another crisis before the September international break. United won late on against Fulham on the opening day but it must be said that more clinical play on the counter-attack from the away team should have seen a different outcome. What is interesting, though, and worth mentioning is that United do set up well for individual games against better sides so, given that, as well as the fact Liverpool are moving to more of a possession-dominant style of football, we may have one of the old-style United-Liverpool ties and that is quite dull for the neutral.
MAN UTD VS LIVERPOOL TIP: UNDER 2.5 GOALS
