Liverpool player ratings vs Manchester City as Alisson struggles badly

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Liverpool came away from the Etihad Stadium with a well-fought point against Manchester City today.

It wasn’t a totally convincing performance from the Reds, but they were good value for the point against their title adversaries. Here’s how we rated the players.

Defence

Alisson Becker: 4 – A really poor day at the office for Alisson, but he still managed to come up with two big saves. His kicking was an issue all day, first putting it on a plate for Phil Foden, before a miscue eventually led to City’s opener. Did redeem himself with a top save from Foden and then Haaland but incredibly lucky not to see a spill from a corner punished.

Trent Alexander-Arnold: 6 – A hard game to judge Trent in, in all honesty. Struggled badly at times against Jeremy Doku but never looked completely out of it and turned up with a beautiful equaliser. That celebration too, have a bit of that.

Joel Matip: 8 Man of the Match – Was actually Liverpool’s most creative player in the first-half, which happens a bit more often that it should. Could do better in marking Haaland, but did excellently on the whole, standing up firm and showing why he should keep the shirt for now.

Virgil van Dijk: 7 – Like Matip, was guilty of some sloppy marking for the goal, and was otherwise not especially involved. Gets an extra point for keeping Haaland relatively quiet.

Kostas Tsimikas: 7– Much more assured than he has been of late, following on from a good display against Brentford.

Midfield

Alexis Mac Allister: 8 – Quietly, this was Mac Allister’s best performance for Liverpool. He repaid Jurgen Klopp’s faith in him as the 6 and showed why the likes of Emile Heskey have called him ‘fantastic‘ this season. Rarely looked troubled until he began to tire in the second-half and was much better in possession.

Dominik Szoboszlai: 6 – Szoboszlai has been a little too quiet of late and that continued at the Etihad. We need to start seeing a bit more from the Hungarian.

Curtis Jones: 4 – It looked a slight risk for Klopp to start Jones after his recent injury, and so it proved. The Scouser put Alisson in trouble with an inexplicable back-pass early on and just couldn’t get up to the speed of the game. Gave it away once too many times and was deservedly hooked.

Attack

Diogo Jota: 5 – Jota didn’t get into the game at all and offered little when he did get on the ball. An injury-induced substitution is a worry.

Darwin Nunez: 6 – Nunez gets an extra point for the way his menacing runs troubled City’s defenders, but he wasn’t great here. Looked a little low on confidence, which given his scoring of late is strange.

Mohamed Salah: 6 – Never looked like scoring on the day, but kept working hard to create openings. Has had better days against the champions.

Substitutes

Ryan Gravenberch: 7 – Much better than Jones when he came on and showed why he should be Klopp’s pick next to Mac Allister and Szoboszlai.

Cody Gakpo: 5 – Came on seemingly determined to foul every City player on the pitch. While we don’t mind that, needed to keep the ball better.

Luis Diaz: 5 – Like Gakpo, couldn’t seem to keep the ball well enough. Messed up a simple ball to Salah when he would have been in. Needs to make more of an impact.

Harvey Elliott: 5 – Almost played Haaland in with a crazy scooped ball back towards his goal.

Wataru Endo: 6 – Looked decent on the ball and picked up a necessary yellow card. A good cameo.