Solskjær: Manchester United will need a great performance against Liverpool
Ole Gunnar Solskjær believes Liverpool will win the title this season because they are the best team in the Premier League but argues they will have to do it again and again to be regarded as the best ever.
Liverpool have recorded the best start to a league season, with 61 points from a possible 63. Keep that up and they will smash Manchester City’s two-year-old record of 100 points in a season, so claims that this might be the best team the Premier League has yet produced are not without foundation. Yet as a member of Manchester United’s treble‑winning side in 1999 and someone who twice saw Sir Alex Ferguson win three titles in a row, Solskjær feels longevity ought to count for something.
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“If you are taking the long view, the very best teams are the ones who can do it again and again and again,” the United manager said. “No one really matches Sir Alex in that respect but I would be the first to admit Jürgen Klopp has done a great job at Liverpool.
“At the moment he seems to know what he’s going to get every time he puts a team out, though we are only just past halfway through the season and there are still a lot of games to go.
“If you look at Liverpool now, they have 33 wins and five draws from their last [their last] 38 [league] games. That’s 104 points, so it would have been a more than decent season. They are doing well, to say the least, and could win a treble this season but let’s see where they are in May. They have a couple of difficult games coming up.”
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Liverpool host United on Sunday then visit Wolves on Thursday and could just about have the title wrapped up by the time they travel to Manchester City in early April.
It is now usual to think of City as Liverpool’s main challengers, – Solskjær described last year’s title battle between the two as “outstanding” — yet United went to the Etihad last month and won. “That result showed we can get to the necessary level,” Solskjær said. “We know we will need a great performance to take anything away from Anfield, we know the atmosphere will be intimidating, but we have shown in meetings with some of the bigger teams this season that we can hold our own. We have prepared for those games really well.
“The last time we played Liverpool they were top of the table and we were only a point off the bottom three. The players must have felt under so much pressure but it didn’t show, they handled it so well. We are more confident now, definitely, and we need to be, because performing at Anfield takes courage and bravery.”
