Man City 3-1 Liverpool: In game and Post Match debates

Plenty of time to make up for this.  We need to learn from the mistakes made tonight, and i'm sure we will. The scoreline does'nt look like a 'tight' game, but according to the guy commentating for Telegraph Live, we were the best team for 40 minutes of the game.  Anyone disagree with that? 

Thats correct. But we did not create alot.

The problem is that you just know that this Liverpool team will concede. We always need 2 or most of the time 3+ goals to win a game of football.

If we were decent at the back I would not have been worried at 0-0 after 35 minutes. The fact is that you just knew if we did not score while we were having the better of the game then we would be in trouble.

The most worrying thing is how we fell apart after the first goal. They carved us apart at will without being near their best.

Anybody looking at the score and seeing that we scored late would think it was routine for city. It was after the 2nd goal but we did not deserve to lose 3-1.

I wouldn't disagree with you mate , we were poor in all areas if i'm honest . Rodgers will need to make big decisions fairly rapid and start dropping certain players to the bench .

Pretty certain Lallana will come in for Allen.
Manquillo will probably start now at RB.
Mario goes upfront, when he gets match sharp.
That probably drops Coutinho.

Injuries aside, Rodgers needs to pick a starting 11& stick with it. Needs consistency more than anything. As it is our back 4 don't know each other yet and need to gel. Stick with it no matter what

How would they 2 games in when 2 are new signings?

We attack, it doesn't work, we don't know what else to do.

Don't concede 3 soft goals?
Then we win 1-0.

Stevie was a passenger. It's not the first he has been exposed by a decent opposition. I'm not surprised he had a bad game either. He's decent in possession but awful when he hasn't the possession as his legs have gone.

Would be nice to really replace him with a class central midfielder but too many fans would throw a tantrum. He's our golden boy - cannot be dropped; won't be dropped. We'll have to wait for him to retire..

I voted Rickie motm simply because he changed the game for us even though we lost .

I went for Sterling purely for his first half performance... that and the fact I couldn't think who else had a good game

I would probably have gone for Morino but for his error.

This is the second game in a row Stevie has gone off the boil throughout the match. He controlled the game for the first 40 minutes but once again, on the backfoot he was nowhere near to be seen, just like what happened against Southampton.

A bit of a worry with his inability to take control of the game when we're up against it.

Pretty certain Lallana will come in for Allen.
Manquillo will probably start now at RB.
Mario goes upfront, when he gets match sharp.
That probably drops Coutinho.

Yeah Allen is just a stop gap until Lallana gets himself sorted , Markovic for Coutinho , he's been poor 2 games on a trot now , he's continuing he's bad form left over from the end of last season . Manquillo i'm surprised he didn't get the shout over Glen who's day's are gone by the way and if Mario isn't up to speed for the Spurs game we'll need to start Lambert as Sturrridge is lacking on his own .

Not worried, seen enough good signs to see us finishing top 4. Few players missing and player match fitness still to improve.

They exploited our left side big time, made us busy, didn't defend  hard enough on the left, gave them too much time on the ball, boom a cross or pass comes in and we were left too open on the right side of the box or centre.

Put those hard tackles in early on the left and we could have avoided one of the goals. Mig needs to do much much better.

Hardest fixture over - it can only get better 

because of the words 'sing a sad song and make it better'.  Mind games.
Second game of the the season, so dont push the panic button yet.   

They always play it they have some chant or other to the tune of Hey Jude about their team

Sounds like Brendans got some big personnel issues to deal with!  None of us will want to see Stevie's role reduced in any way. But, the club is bigger than any one player. Difficult.

Today's game showed that Gerrard cannot be an automatic starter. Sorry to say but he just does not the legs to keep up with the game for 90 minutes.

Not worried, seen enough good signs to see us finishing top 4. Few players missing and player match fitness still to come.

We need to be getting past the top four at this stage, 25yrs on now and with the signings we got in the title is our quest and let Arsenal worry about 4th spot .

I take everyones point here on Gerrard.

The day will come in the not too distant future ... such as life sadly.

But is anybody more worried about how poor our defence is and has been for 2 years now? A couple of huffs and puffs and they cave in every time. Teams do not have to do alot to score past us.

We need to score 2 or most of the time 3+ goals to win a game of football. We cannot defend. For me this is more of a concern than the future of our captain.

I take everyones point here on Gerrard.

The day will come in the not too distant future ... such as life sadly.

But is anybody more worried about how poor our defence is and has been for 2 years now? A couple of huffs and puffs and they cave in every time. Teams do not have to do alot to score past us.

We need to score 2 or most of the time 3+ goals to win a game of football. We cannot defend. For me this is more of a concern than the future of our captain.

When Manquillo comes in we will have more defensively on the right flank and same with Moreno once he gets a couple games under his belt.

What worried me was Lovren and Skrtel as a duo looked rash once City's attack got really going. Lovren was a beast in the first half, but once they got in behind us once or twice it became too easy.

For the Tottenham game I would have.

Manquillo    Lovren     Sakho     Moreno

A lot of people overreacting to the result, which I guess is understandable considering we've been in such great form over the last 6 months.  However, I just can't wrap my head around the "supporters" who needlessly bash on our players.  It's fine for you not to like them (you are entitled to your opinion) but we don't need the constant negativity on the board do we

Overall, I thought there were some positive signs to take away from the game:

- Despite being at fault for the first goal, Moreno looked lively and I think against most other teams he will bring us a lot of joy as an attacking outlet down the left flank.  He's rather snappy in the tackle too!

- Allen looks like he is growing into a solid CM.  He doesn't do anything fancy, but he is good in possession and he reads the game well to press when we lose the ball.  I just don't think we have enough creativity in the engine room with him, Stevie, and Hendo all playing. 

- Markovic was lively and showed why he is so highly rated.  Not even on the field 2 minutes and we fashioned 2 decent chances from his flank.  When he hits full fitness and finds his feet in England he will be a very good player for us. 

- Studge looks better suited to playing with a strike partner.  Hopefully Balo can strike up a quick partnership with him. 

At the end of the day, we took one on the chin from last seasons champions on their turf.  It happens.  Dust yourselves off and refocus on Spurs. 

When Manquillo comes in we will have more defensively on the right flank and same with Moreno once he gets a couple games under his belt.

What worried me was Lovren and Skrtel as a duo looked rash once City's attack got really going. Lovren was a beast in the first half, but once they got in behind us once or twice it became too easy.

For the Tottenham game I would have.

Manquillo    Lovren     Sakho     Moreno

Hmmm chopping and changing ... we need organisation and stability. I feel Sakho is rash ... he is yet to convince me.

We push our full backs too far up. Then our CB's end up too far apart covering the space if our mids don't get back in. In games like tonight you have to be hard to beat. We were anything but after 35 minutes.

Sunday will tell us plenty about this team. Spurs have had a good start but I would expect a reaction from us.

For the Tottenham game I would have.

Manquillo    Lovren     Sakho     Moreno

Rodgers will eventually have to make that big decision and completely change it around . I can't see him doing it against Spurs though .

Rodgers will eventually have to make that big decision and completely change it around . I can't see him doing it against Spurs though .

Yeah there is no rush, in hindsight we did play the best team in the pl so yeah.

But I would feel a lot more comfortable with that back four.

So, what does this loss mean?

The result is similar to ours last season here (we lost 1-2), although the manner we lost this time around is more annoying.
Their clinical finishing is the main difference tonight, they did make mistakes at the back, but we couldn't punish them enough, while our mistakes were punished immediately. Jovetic is a really good player and Agüero is Agüero. There is no doubt Citeh is a really good side with all their good attacking players and they have capability to score more goals than they can concede.

Personally I'm not yet worried with our performance, some cheap goals, still early in the season and I hope we can get better, usually we do and hopefully this is sooner rather than later.

Overall, I thought there were some positive signs to take away from the game:

Not going to quote your whole post but agree with it in it's entirety.