What Roy Keane said about Liverpool’s Premier League chances immediately after Man City defeat

Keane, who had earlier labelled Liverpool ‘dreadful’, was very much of the mind that the result had ended their title defence.

“You can’t be considering Liverpool for the title,” the Irishman said on Sky Sports.

“That was a sore defeat.

“But this reminded me of City of old. They were outstanding. They are back in the mix.”

On paper, one can understand the ex-Premier League star’s point of view, given that we now lag eight points behind Arsenal at the top of the table.

We should consider ourselves fortunate that the Gunners’ 2-2 draw with Sunderland on Saturday means that we head into the international break less than 10 points behind!

It’s a big lead to take with 11 games played – though not a totally unassailable one in our view.

That said, Liverpool need to find some consistency after the break and win their upcoming winnable run of games.

Who do Liverpool play after the international break?

Liverpool’s run of Premier League games after the international break sees them face:

• November 22: Nottingham Forest (H)
• November 30: West Ham (A)
• December 3: Sunderland (H)
• December 6: Leeds (A)
• December 13: Brighton (H)

What does Arne Slot think about Liverpool’s title hopes?

Speaking after the full-time whistle, Arne Slot refused to rule Liverpool out of the title race.

The Dutch head coach told reporters (via Lewis Steele on X): “The last thing I should speak about now is the title race.

“We should focus on getting results. We are eighth.”

It’s a fair response from the manager at a time when the league table simply does not present Liverpool at their best heading into the November international break.

Is the Premier League table misleading?

It’s worth pointing out that, beyond the eight-point gap from Arsenal in first and the Reds in eighth, things are looking quite tight from second to tenth.

Fifth to ninth in the table, including Arne Slot’s Liverpool, are level on 18 points.

Remarkably, only five points separate second place in the Premier League (Man City) from Crystal Palace in tenth place.

Is it still disappointing that we’ve fallen outside of the top four spots with a 3-0 defeat in Manchester? Of course.

But to suggest Liverpool have a full-blown crisis on their hands would also be disingenuous.