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Comparing Liverpool’s ‘poor’ spell to five other great Premier League teams

Planet Football •

After a brilliant season, Liverpool have suffered a rare dip in form in recent weeks – but it shouldn’t be something to worry about.  

Jurgen Klopp’s side have lost three of their last four games in all competitions and were knocked out of the FA Cup by Chelsea.

But every team has a few setbacks, and we’ve compared Liverpool’s bad form with the worst spells of five other great Premier League sides.

Manchester United 1998-99

United’s 1998-99 team is regarded as one of the best club sides of all time, but they won just one game in eight during November and December.

Sir Alex Ferguson’s side fell to a 3-1 league defeat away at Sheffield Wednesday before bouncing back with a 3-2 home win against Leeds.

But they were then knocked out of the League Cup by Tottenham and that was followed by three consecutive draws in the Premier League.

A 1-1 draw against Bayern Munich in the Champions League group stages was sandwiched in between those stalemates before a 3-2 league defeat at home to Middlesbrough.

United’s poor form saw them drop to third in the league at Christmas, but they then went unbeaten for the rest of the season and completed a famous treble.

Arsenal 2003-04

Arsenal famously went unbeaten in the Premier League throughout the 2003-04 season, but they were unable to add any other silverware to their league title.

The Gunners lost 1-0 to Manchester United in the FA Cup semi-final in April and were knocked out of the Champions League three days later.

After a 1-1 draw to Chelsea in the first-leg of the quarter-final, they lost 2-1 at Highbury and crashed out of Europe.

But April wasn’t all bad for Arsenal as they secured the league title after a 2-2 draw against Tottenham at the end of the month.

Chelsea 2004-05

Chelsea had replaced Arsenal as the most dominant team in the Premier League by 2004-05, but they still suffered back to back defeats that season.

Jose Mourinho’s side were knocked out the FA Cup by Newcastle United in February and then lost 2-1 to Barcelona in the first-leg of their Champions League last-16 tie.

They also went three games without a win in all competitions in April, which most notably included the 3-2 defeat to Bayern Munich when Mourinho infamously hid in a laundry basket.

Chelsea didn’t let that derail their season as they still won the league with 95 points, although they were knocked out of the Champions League by Liverpool in the semi-finals.

Manchester United 2007-08

United may have won the Premier League and Champions League double in 2007-08, but it was actually quite a slow start to the season.

They were held to surprise 0-0 draw by 10-man Reading in their opening game and then dropped another two points against Portsmouth in the next fixture.

United hoped to get their title defence back on track in the Manchester derby but Geovanni’s winning goal ensured that United were 17th in the table after three games.

The Red Devils finally got their first win of the season against Tottenham at the end of August and went on to win 10 of their next 11 fixtures in all competitions after that.

Manchester City 2017-18

Just like Liverpool, City had an incredible start to their season, winning 19 of their first 20 Premier League games.

The title was practically wrapped up by the end of February, but a disastrous week in April threatened to put a dampener on their season.

City lost their Champions League last-16 first-leg 3-0 against Liverpool at Anfield, and they then threw away the chance to win the title against Manchester United a few days later.

After leading 2-0 at half-time, City conceded three goals in 16 minutes as United completed a remarkable turnaround and put their celebrations on ice.

To make matters worse, Liverpool completed the job and knocked City out of the Champions League by winning 2-1 at the Etihad in the second leg.

The Blues still won the league a few days later and became the first Premier league team to reach 100 points in a single season.

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