Jurgen Klopp and Pep Guardiola will meet this afternoon at Anfield for the last time in the Premier League, undoubtedly putting an end to a rivalry that has marked an era of English football.”At the moment, I admire both teams. Liverpool and Manchester City play fantastic football, but you know, every era comes to an end,” Erik ten Hag spoke with immense self-assurance during his presentation at Old Trafford, unaware that he would witness the end of an era much sooner than he had hoped. Understandably, it’s a conclusion not credited to the Manchester United coach, despite his conviction that it would be. By deciding to leave Liverpool at the end of the current season, Jurgen Klopp has saddened not only the fans of his club but also neutral football enthusiasts because his departure from Anfield signalled the end of a great rivalry.Whether the rivalry between Jurgen Klopp and Pep Guardiola is the greatest in English football is a matter of personal taste. To characterize it as such, we’ll agree that there has been a lack of animosity between the clubs and a richer history of past encounters, but equally importantly, there has been a shortage of bitterness, hostility, and, ultimately – hatred between the teams in recent years.🎥 Bench Cam: Klopp v Guardiola edition! pic.twitter.com/mckYThfggF— Premier League (@premierleague) March 8, 2024 Only in the days leading up to today’s match at Anfield, which will be the epicentre of European football this week, did sparks fly between the two clubs. Trent Alexander-Arnold poked fun at his rivals by stating that, although Liverpool has won fewer trophies (10 compared to 16 since Guardiola’s arrival at the Etihad), they mean more to them than to City due to differences in finances. Erling Haaland didn’t stay silent, responding that Alexander-Arnold wouldn’t know that until he won the “quadruple” crown. Then, as usual, Klopp and Guardiola intervened, calming the tensions.”Pep is the best coach in the world. I’m completely fine with not being close to him. I don’t know how to rate coaches from the past, but in my life, he’s the best. I’ve never been frustrated by that; I knew 3000 better players than myself during my playing career, but I still loved the game. They just told me I have a positive record against Pep. I have no idea how that happened, to be honest. Facing him always made me a better coach because I always had to find solutions against him. I’m also very good at what I do, not to sound wrong, but if you ask me who the best is – he is the best. Boom!”, Klopp declared at the press conference on Friday, as he would before almost every previous match against City, always praising his greatest rival.##EDITORS_CHOICE##Guardiola, too, would often be eloquent when speaking about the German coach. When asked who caused him the most trouble during his managerial career, the Catalan coach’s answer was always the same. Not Sir Alex Ferguson, nor Jose Mourinho, nor Carlo Ancelotti, whom he faced in many big matches, but the one he faced the most times and who outsmarted him the most during his coaching career (12 times counting his time at Bayern Munich).”Jurgen Klopp. Firstly, because we faced each other a million times, in Dortmund and here. Secondly, because he beat me many times, and it was a challenge again and again and again. The way his teams always play, Dortmund, previously Mainz, now Liverpool. So attractive for the viewers, so positive. We respect each other, at least that’s my opinion, I respect him a lot. Of course, we have discussions, and I don’t like losing to him, but he is my greatest rival because of how many times we’ve played against each other, how tough it was, and how satisfying it is when we beat them, because we know how hard it is to do that.”Sparks are flying ahead of the clash of the titans – Pep not eager to get into a war of wordsUnlike many, especially older rivalries, where coaches would start ‘wars’ in press rooms and try to disrupt each other with psychological games from the start, Jurgen and Pep based their relationship primarily on respect, directing their focus solely on the pitch, aware that creating tensions before matches could only diminish the quality of football. And the quality has always been top-notch, so rich that only one of the 21 matches between the two coaches ended goalless, while the average of 3.2 goals per match is significantly above the Premier League average during their era.You often hear in sports about how one team wouldn’t be where it is without another pushing it forward. Healthy competition has always been the driving force behind every great athlete. Double Olympic decathlon champion Daley Thompson once said that he trained twice on Christmas because he hoped his rivals had only done one training session, and there are many similar examples in sports.If anything was missing, it was the mutual animosity during Jurgen’s and Pep’s era in England. In the past seven and a half years, you couldn’t see Trent Alexander-Arnold throwing pizza at Pep Guardiola, Ruben Dias getting in Mohamed Salah’s face after a missed penalty, Rodri arguing with Jordan Henderson in the tunnel before the match, or Guardiola calling Klopp a “specialist in failure” because he beat him four times and only conceded one title – which City fans would say is the era’s only failure.Klopp: I’m not bad but Pep is the best! This match is not deciding the title”It was pretty toxic for a while,” Sir Alex Ferguson once said, referring to the rivalry between his Manchester United and Arsene Wenger’s Arsenal at the turn of the century, marked on the island as the fiercest. Guardiola also knows very well how tense the relationship between two clubs can be. He realized this in Barcelona when Jose Mourinho’s provocations during one ‘El Clásico’ culminated in a physical altercation between the Real Madrid coach and Guardiola’s assistant, Tito Vilanova. With Klopp, however, it’s different. Whether in Germany or England, it continued. With Klopp, Guardiola only ‘fights’ on the field.And although the rivalry between Ferguson and Wenger won in terms of ‘animosity,’ many will say that strictly in terms of quality, it can’t match the current one between City and Liverpool, or Guardiola and Klopp. Indeed, in the first eight seasons after joining the Premier League, Wenger brought three titles to Arsenal, with the remaining five going to Ferguson’s United. However, during the mentioned period of dominance of the two clubs, it never happened that both teams crossed the 80-point mark in the same season, and occasionally another team would appear and separate them on the table.Jurgen Klopp. Pep Guardiola. Thank you. ❤️ pic.twitter.com/nvUZdR4RcR— Premier League (@premierleague) March 8, 2024 Guardiola and Klopp, on the other hand, pushed each other year after year to heights that would have been difficult to reach without the other. So high that in the 2018/19 season, Liverpool forced City to win 14 games in a row to be the first to cross the finish line, that the champion was once literally decided by centimetres, and that on two occasions, 97 and 92 points respectively, weren’t enough for the Reds to claim the title, all the while shaping English football tactically, adjusting their styles to each other and learning from each other, noticing over the years how Liverpool became more patient and City more direct.”Liverpool is the toughest opponent I’ve faced in 12 or 13 years of my coaching career. I don’t know if Jurgen respects me, but he must know that I respect him a lot. He makes me a better coach, at Bayern with Dortmund, here as well. His teams are always positive, aggressive, and always want to score goals, they want to attack. I’m trying to imitate him. We’re not friends, I have his number, but I don’t call him. We don’t have dinner together; we’ll have dinner one day at the Hall of Fame,” Guardiola said in March 2022 after another match (2-2) that “blew up” the British Islands on so many levels, followed by an energetic handshake and hug between the two coaches.##NAJAVA_MECA_7939336##They have always been central figures in matches between City and Liverpool. During the Ferguson-Wenger era, the focus would be on the duel between Roy Keane and Patrick Vieira; when Guardiola faced Mourinho in La Liga, it was always ‘Lionel Messi vs. Cristiano Ronaldo’; when Mourinho and Rafa Benitez faced each other, it was about Frank Lampard vs. Steven Gerrard… When City takes on Liverpool, it’s hard to draw parallels between the teams. In matches between teams whose inherent strength is one full-backs and wingers, and the other midfield, it always came down to who would better utilize their strengths and exploit the opponent’s weaknesses. The best possession team in the world against the best team in the world without the ball.The only thing missing during this seven-and-a-half-year City-Liverpool era is the grand final. They met at various stages of the FA Cup, League Cup, and Champions League, but not in a final match for a trophy. However, even the match at Wembley would hardly match the Premier League showdown in terms of intensity, especially in the midst of the battle when only one point separates the teams in the table.So let England truly shake one more time, for the last time.PREMIER LEAGUE – MATCHDAY 28SaturdayMan. Utd. – Everton 2-0 (2-0)/Fernandes 12 pen, Rashford 36 pen/Wolverhampton – Fulham 2-1 (0-0)/Ait-Nouri 52, Semedo 67 – Iwobi 90+9/Crystal Palace – Luton 1-1 (1-0)/Mateta 10 – Woodrow 90+6/Bournemouth – Sheffield Utd 2-2 (0-1)/Ouattara 64, Unal 90+2 – Hamer 28, Robinson 65/Arsenal – Brentford 2-1 (1-1)/Rice 19, Havertz 86 – Wissa 45+4/Sunday16:00: (2.45) Aston Villa (3.70) Tottenham (2.90)17:00: (1.65) West Ham (3.70) Burnley (5.60)17:00: (1.80) Brighton (3.70) Nott.Forest (5.00)18:45: (3.05) Liverpool (3.70) Man.City (2.35)Monday23:00: (2.00) Chelsea (3.70) Newcastle (3.90)***odds are subject to change***
