Simon Jordan thinks the Premier League title will be contested between Manchester City and Liverpool next season – and has tipped Jurgen Klopp’s Reds to go one better than the previous campaign.
Liverpool were pipped to the league despite totting up 97 points last year, but former Crystal Palace chairman Jordan believes their Champions League win will provide the momentum for a successful title challenge.
He told TalkSPORT: “I think it’s going to be very tight between Liverpool and Manchester City. I think Liverpool winning the Champions League might give them that extra bit of impetus because Klopp has now got that monkey off his back that he’s been at Liverpool and not won anything.
“As much as it galls me, I’d like to see Liverpool winning the Premier League because I think it adds to the stable of winners, because a Liverpool side that hasn’t won the Premier League – given their history and given the history of English football over the last 40 or 50 years – doesn’t feel entirely right.
“I think Liverpool will win the league if they can keep Salah and Firmino and Mane fit – but I think it’ll be nip and tuck between those two sides that were competing for it last year.”
Manchester City and Liverpool comfortably kept the title race to themselves, with the Reds some 25 points clear of third-placed Chelsea by the end of the season.
But Liverpool will only know too well that bridging even a gulf of that size is possible, as they finished 25 points behind City in 2017/18, a year before going so close to completely overhauling Pep Guardiola’s side.
As for Jordan’s comments, any evidence of Champions League impetus has not revealed itself if Liverpool’s pre-season is anything to go by – with Klopp’s men winning just three of their seven pre-season fixtures ahead of their Community Shield showdown with City this weekend.
