Liverpool are dreaming of a quadruple. Manchester City are dreaming of a treble. They stand in each others’ way in the Premier League, are the bookies’ favourites stand in each others’ way in the Champions League—though City will have to get past Real Madrid and Liverpool past Villarreal first—and on Saturday, they meet in the FA Cup semi-final. The winner will take on Chelsea or Crystal Palace in the final on May 14th.
Last week, they drew in Premier League acton at The Etihad to maintain City’s one-point league lead with seven games to play. With Bayern Munich’s ouster from Europe at the hands of Villarreal, they are the consensus two best club teams in all of football. It would seem hard, perhaps, for any game to measure up to the level of hype and expectation set out by all of that, and yet last weekend’s league game managed to do just that—to live up to the hype.
Now the two sides go again, and you can stick with The Liverpool Offside for full coverage of Saturday afternoon’s FA Cup semi-final between Jürgen Klopp’s Reds and Pep Guardiola’s Citizens from Wembley.