Liverpool and Manchester City are going head-to-head for three trophies this season, but the rivalry is struggling to catch light.
In the build-up to the match between Manchester City and Liverpool, it felt as though there was a clamour for it to represent something more greater or more meaningful. City may be chasing a treble and Liverpool a quadruple at the end of a season when these two clubs have already proved themselves to be head and shoulders above their rivals both domestically and in European football. But this, it seemed, wasn’t enough.
There was an apparent desire on the part of many onlookers for this to develop into the defining moment of a nascent rivalry. But what does ‘rivalry’ mean in the 21st century? And is it possible to truly replicate the frenzied rush of emotions of a local derby for two clubs with no particularly great history of mutual animosity, in which the feud largely constitutes a simple race for as much silverware as possible?
No definitive answers to these questions were provided by the match itself. While it was a tremendously entertaining game played between two superbly talented teams, there was little blood and thunder. Even the result itself was inconclusive. With honours even, the destination of the Premier League title was not definitively decided, and with an FA Cup semi-final to follow and the probability of the two clubs having to play each other again in the Champions League slowly reducing, it felt at the final whistle as though the biggest battle between these two clubs this season may be yet to come.
But after the final whistle there were complaints that if it exists at all, this rivalry was a little too ‘friendly’. The managers and players themselves embraced at full-time, an entente cordiale that deeply aggrieved those who want the language of the closing stages of this campaign to be conflict. The players, it was posited, didn’t hate each other enough, and the reaction of the managers towards each…
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at Football365…