Manchester City regained the top of the English Premier League after losing temporarily for two hours in favor of chasing Liverpool, who beat Watford 2-0 on Saturday, so that the defending champion responded with the same result against its host Burnley in the opening of the thirty-first stage.
City raised its lead to 73 points from 30 games, keeping the point difference with Liverpool, while Chelsea’s third and European champions’ balance froze at 59 with their resounding fall against their guest Brentford 1-4.
After the difference between the two teams reached 14 points, Liverpool rose up with a series of wonderful matches, reaching its tenth victory in a row on Saturday.
What increases the intensity and excitement of the competition between the two teams is that they will meet twice this month, the first in the league at Al-Ittihad Stadium next Sunday in a match whose outcome may be decisive to determine the destination of the title, and the second a week later at Wembley Stadium in the cup semi-finals.
In the first, City repeated its victory over Burnley after it was dropped by the same result, with goals from Portuguese Bernardo Silva and Belgian Kevin De Bruyne, achieving his tenth victory over his opponent in various competitions, during which he scored 34 goals and conceded a goal.
And the runner-up of the Champions League last season prepared in the best possible way for his European entitlement, three days later, against his guest, Atletico Madrid, in the first leg of the quarter-finals of the continental competition.
Burnley, the bottom runner-up with 21 points, lost their fourth successive league defeat to Leicester City and Brentford, with the same score, 0-2, and Chelsea by four.
City decided the result in a one-way first half, during which, as usual, they controlled the ball and managed to score twice at their hosts, while Burnley struggled to capitalize on the crumbs of the opportunities they had obtained.
De Bruyne opened the scoring after a joint game from Spaniard Rodri to Raheem Sterling, and from him to the Belgian international inside the penalty area, with a strong right-footed shot in the opposite corner, in his tenth goal in the league this season.
Sterling returned to the fore with a second decisive pass to German captain Ilkay Gundogan, who followed up with a “on the fly” shot that deceived goalkeeper Nick Pope.
City’s most dangerous opportunity appeared in the second half with a ball from Phil Foden’s replacement, Brazilian striker Gabriel Jesus, who blocked the post.
“When you arrive in May and fight for the title, it means you’ve had a great season,” City coach Pep Guardiola said after the win.
“Being here at the top is because we do our best and we’ve done it every season. Thanks to everyone.”
Liverpool leads for two hours
With Senegalese striker Sadio Mane sitting on the bench a few days after leading his country to the World Cup finals at the expense of his Egyptian colleague Mohamed Salah, who played a key Saturday, Liverpool prepared with a historic quartet in the best way for his trip on Tuesday to Portugal, where he faces Benfica in the first leg of the quarter-finals of the League competition heroes.
And in his nineteenth confrontation on “Anfield” against coaches who had previously supervised him, this time Roy Hodgson, who failed to repeat the April 2012 scenario with West Bromwich when he became and is still the only former coach of the “reds” team to win them in their stronghold, Liverpool struggled to enter the atmosphere after Return from the window dedicated to international matches.
But the brilliant Portuguese Diogo Jota, who was excited about leading his country to the 2022 World Cup through the European supplement, succeeded in opening the scoring for German coach Jurgen Klopp’s team from the first real opportunity, with a header after a cross from Joe Gomez, taking advantage of a wrong exit from goalkeeper Ben Foster, to raise his score to 14 goals alone in second place on the scorers list behind his colleague Salah.
“The Premier League is the most important competition,” Klopp said after his team’s victory. “This week will determine what May will be. The players have built strong foundations and now we have to use them.”
“I don’t think after the international break I saw the best game of the season,” he added, “and we were very mature and in control of the match.”
After the goal, Liverpool returned to suffering in building attacks and did not threaten their guest’s goal until the 38th minute, when Foster starred this time in blocking Jota’s shot from a narrow angle.
The result remained the same until the end of the first half, in which Watford was the best and even the most dangerous, similar to the beginning of the second half, in which Liverpool was affected by the suffering of its star Salah in particular, as the Egyptian missed his usual danger.
Klopp resorted to Mane instead of Salah in the 69th minute, hoping that the African champions would be able to secure the result for the hosts with a second goal, but he did not, in turn, provide anything to keep Jota’s goal separating the two teams until the last seconds when the Portuguese himself snatched a penalty kick from the Slovakian Juraj Kotska Anbri Her Brazilian Fabinho successfully, dealing the final blow to the guests who received the eighth defeat in a row in the stronghold of “The Reds”.
The first since 1939
And in London at Stamford Bridge, Brentford stunned his neighbor and his guest Chelsea with a triple within 10 minutes, alternating with German Vitaly Yanlet and Danish Christian Eriksen, returning to the stadiums after a heart attack he suffered in the European Cup last summer, before adding the fourth through the Congolese Yuan Wesa. , in response to the goal of the lead from the owners of the land of German defender Antonio Rudiger.
Despite its first loss against Burnley since 1939, Chelsea seems to guarantee its participation in the Champions League, in which it continues this season’s campaign to defend the title, but it will clash in the quarter-finals with Real Madrid, the record holder in the number of titles.
Despite suffering from the circumstances imposed by the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the sanctions imposed on its Russian owner Roman Abramovich, German coach Thomas Tuchel’s team was not affected by the results until its loss to Brentford, opening the door to the possibility of reducing Arsenal’s fourth, which is five points behind him, the difference between them in the event of a victory over Hosted by Crystal Palace on Monday.
At Old Trafford, Manchester United, in the absence of its sick Portuguese star Cristiano Ronaldo, fell into a positive draw against Leicester City 1-1.
The guest opened the scoring with the goal of Nigerian striker Kelechi Ihyanacho, and Brazilian Adel Farid “The Red Devils”.
The referee disallowed a goal for Leicester midfielder James Maddison after returning to the video assistant referee (VAR) for calculating a foul by Ihyanacho on French defender Raphael Varane before passing the ball.
Leeds United drew 1-1 with Southampton, and Brighton drew with Norwich City, while Wolverhampton beat Aston Villa 2-1.