Liverpool slumped to another shock home defeat on Wednesday night
Mark Lawrenson says Liverpool’s title hopes are over if they lose to Manchester City.
Jurgen Klopp’s men finished 18 points above Pep Guardiola’s side last season, but now the 2019 Premier League winners are in pole position to claim the trophy back.
The two sides meet at Anfield on Sunday with the visitors seven points above the Reds, and with a game in hand.
After a disappointing run of results, Liverpool looked to have turned the tide with consecutive 3-1 victories on the road against Tottenham and West Ham.
That good work was undone on Wednesday night, however, as they went down 1-0 at home against Brighton.
With City having disposed of Burnley 2-0 at Turf Moor, Guardiola’s team will go to Anfield full of confidence.
Liverpool legend Lawrenson believes a negative result will end any hope of his former side retaining their title.
Speaking to talkSPORT, he said: “I thought the last couple of results for Liverpool, winning at Tottenham where they played well and beating West Ham, it makes you think ‘they’re back’.
“It looked like they had that swagger back, they looked more confident.
“But last night was just really really strange.
“They played like a bunch of strangers in all honesty, they hardly created too much which is most unusual to them.
“Last night’s result was a big surprise. We knew Brighton would make it difficult because they’re in a good run, but it was a very strange result.
“You look back at the quality of the goals they scored against West Ham in the second-half, they were really quality team goals, and then that performance last night – that will drive Klopp mad.
“That result is the worst one for him. You understood how they lost to Burnley because they were on a bit of a bad run, but to win two difficult games on the road against Tottenham and West Ham and then lose at home to Brighton?
“It’s like, wow. It’s almost time to return to base and start again, he has to have a re-think.
“Klopp will be perplexed, he’ll be wondering what is going wrong. And he can’t change the team around too much because when that front-three are firing they can beat anybody.
“It’s a strange one, very, very strange.
“The City game is absolutely massive.
“If City go there and win, I think they’ll just walk away with the league.”
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