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Gary Neville makes blunt Liverpool point in discussion over who can stop Man City
Gary Neville believes Liverpool are the only team who can challenge Manchester City.
But the Manchester United has urged the Reds and the other clubs with intentions of toppling City to get their “backsides in gear”.
Pep Guardiola’s side were crowned Premier League champions for the third successive season on Saturday after Arsenal fell to defeat against Nottingham Forest.
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Under the guise of the trophy-laden Spaniard, and having tasted success domestically once again, City are now turning their attention to winning the Treble as they prepare to face rivals Man United in the FA Cup final and then Inter Milan in the Champions League final.
And Neville, who won the Treble with United during his playing days, has had his say on their domination. He told Sky Sports: “It’s difficult because you’re asking people to achieve the same standards in a very tough league year after year.
“Ordinarily, what happens, you see a drop off the year after where everyone relaxes, you don’t see that with Pep Guardiola, he doesn’t allow that to happen. The players have bought into that, the consistency, the reliability, the standard-setting over a long period of time is a real achievement.
“What he’s done is dominated the Premier League over the last four, five, six years. Liverpool did brilliantly to hang on to their coattails and win a Premier League title for two, three, four seasons – so well done to them for challenging this City side.
“But I’m not one of those who say that it’s an unfair competition. I’m one of those that says to the rest of them, ‘get your backsides in gear, get yourselves together, play better and do better to try reach the standards of Manchester City’.
“We don’t want to see Manchester City drop their standards for everybody else to level with them, we want to see everybody else push those standards and Jurgen Klopp did that at Liverpool for two or three seasons.”
Arsenal led the Premier League table for most of the season only for the nous of City to get them over the line. Their Premier League title coronation today comes after they tore apart holders Real Madrid to reach their second Champions League final in three years.
Whether City can be stopped, Neville continued: “The team that have got an alignment of quality and mentality (can challenge City). Manchester City’s players have real quality, that goes without saying, but the most difficult moments of the season, they’re able to put a run together and come through difficult challenges.
“That takes a lot, takes the manager as well who can guide them and bring stability. The others have to look at that same model. It happened at Manchester United for a number of years under Sir Alex Ferguson, it happened under Liverpool with Bob Paisley and Bill Shankly – great managers. You’ve got to be a great manager and you’ve got to have a great group of players and the other team have to aspire to that. At this moment in time, the one who has proved it over the last four or five years is Liverpool.
“I know Arsenal have run City close but the only team I can say at the moment that have demonstrated that they can go close to Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City is Jurgen Klopp and Liverpool. I know they’ve dropped well below the standards this season but you don’t know whether they are going to get back to them standards next season because they have proved they can do that before.”
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