Steven Gerrard feels it is impossible to divide Liverpool and Manchester City ahead of Sunday’s mouth-watering Premier League clash at Anfield.
The joint-league leaders face off for the first time this season in a fixture that has started to tease signs in recent years of becoming a modern classic.
Both still remain unbeaten in the league on six wins and one draw, with City only on top thanks to their superior goal difference.
Jurgen Klopp and Pep Guardiola’s men shared the spoils in the league last season as both emerged victorious in their meetings at home.
Having seen his side put five unanswered goals past the Reds at the Etihad, Guardiola travelled to Merseyside in January to witness Liverpool at their devastating best in a thrilling 4-3 defeat.
Needless to say it could be a goal-fest this weekend.
“I think it’s a big test for both teams, it’s a genuine 50-50 game,” Gerrard told Sky Sports.
“They’ve looked the best two teams domestically, as the table suggests. There will be world-class players all over the pitch, it’s a game that you can’t miss.”
No manager in world football has a better record against Guardiola’s teams than Klopp, with the German having won eight, drawn one and lost five against his opposite number.
That record includes home and away victories in last season’s Champions League quarter-final clash, across which Klopp’s men tormented City’s defence in a way no other team had been able to.
City’s ‘All or Nothing’ documentary recently supplied a fascinating insight into Guardiola’s desire to halt the Reds at the time, capturing the former Barcelona man admitting his fear of Liverpool’s front three prior to his side’s league meeting with Everton.
It’s for Liverpool’s outstanding start to the campaign from a defensive point of view and their lacklustre efforts in the final-third that raises new questions over an increasingly unpredictable contest.
Klopp’s men may be yet to click up top, but they enter this game well aware of the chaos they can cause if City again choose to go toe-to-toe with them.