Liverpool Will “Start Over” Against Manchester City in Second Leg

The message from Liverpool has been clear and consistent: the Reds won’t be heading to The Etihad for the second leg of their Champions League quarter final tie with Manchester City looking to get over the line by nursing their 3-0 advantage from the first leg.

According to midfielder Gini Wijnaldum, the reason for that is City’s quality—they may be 3-0 down on aggregate, but they’re still the Premier League’s top side with an unmatched record in attacking. If Liverpool can score three at home, then so too can City.

“Manchester City are the best team in the league this season [so] to create a score like that gives an extra boost and a lot of confidence,” Wijnaldum told Premier League Productions. “But we have to know it’s not over. Anything can happen in the second game.”

If Liverpool sit back and let City dictate the game then certainly anything could happen—and it might well be an anything that’s bad for Liverpool. The visiting Reds, though, feel they know how to unsettle this City side. And that’s by pressing and attacking them back.

Which all adds up to trying to put that 3-0 aggregate lead out of their minds and approaching the game on Tuesday night as though it’s a fresh slate—and a game that Liverpool will need to press and attack in in order to have a chance of winning.

“I think we did well in the first game,” Wijnaldum added. “The way we played against them was not something that suits them and they had a lot of problems with it. But the second game now can be different. So we will start over.”