For Manchester United fans it is the doomsday scenario: Liverpool and Manchester City vying for the title – one of their two fiercest rivals guaranteed to be the 2018-19 Premier League champions.
As City’s Kyle Walker says: “United fans are in a difficult situation obviously. When I’m out and about or walking my dogs, United fans are coming up to me saying, ‘We’d rather City win the league than Liverpool’.” So is this true? The Guardian asked five United supporters.
Stephen Howson, Manchester United YouTuber
City have won titles recently. So it’s less of an irk. I’d rather they don’t retain one. But the prospect of Liverpool winning the title horrifies me. They’re the most pandered to/perspective lacking football club. They simply can’t win. But it’s gross having both of them going for it – the worst summer imaginable could happen. Liverpool win the league or City do a treble and we end up fifth.
Statman Dave, Squawka
I would rather see Manchester City win the Premier League than Liverpool. Our friends down the M62 are currently two titles behind us and I’d like to keep them there. City going from five to six league titles scares me less than the idea of an era of Anfield dominance under Jürgen Klopp beginning. At this stage I’m more fearful of a Liverpool double than a City treble. It was a difficult start to the season seeing City and Liverpool challenging. But since December, with Ole Gunnar Solskjær in charge, we’ve seen glimpses of the Manchester United of old. Of the eight Champions League quarter-final starting XIs Manchester United had the second-youngest average age after Ajax. This bodes well.
James Griffin, saw his first United game in 1957
I’d prefer City to win the league as they have only won it a few times. Liverpool for us is like Barça-Real Madrid or Celtic-Rangers – it cuts deep. Liverpool have fans all over like United, City not so. However, I am desperate for us to beat City in Wednesday’s derby as the bottom line is that Manchester United are more important to me than any other team. A domestic treble for City sounds good but is a long way from United’s treble as ours includes the European Cup and, lest we forget it, we were world champions later in 1999. This season should have been a good one but José was in his third season with us and it soon fell apart. His refusal to play young players was an insult to our heritage. We have brilliant kids now and we will get better.
Adam Robertson, United season ticket holder
I’d definitely prefer City over the Scousers. The thought of enduring a summer of them if they won the league is unbearable. Watching City win it is always bad enough but at least we wouldn’t be hearing about it every five minutes like with Liverpool. The love-in from the media would be horrendous. They’d be wheeling everyone out on it. Making me shudder thinking about it right now! The prospect of City winning the domestic treble does not make me wary of a City title win: without the Champions League it doesn’t even count as a treble in my eyes. The cups are not what they used to be either, the FA Cup especially. It wouldn’t even get close to 2008 when we did the Double. It’s been tough watching City and Liverpool challenging, I’m not going to lie. Other than beating PSG maybe, my biggest result was the other night watching City get beat by good old VAR. Them not doing the quadruple was massive but the fact that plenty of Reds have celebrated that more than anything our own team has done tells you all you need to know about our season.
Alistair Fergusson, lifelong United fan
City are the lesser of the two evils for me. Liverpool are the historic enemy who I always like to see fail, whereas City are fairly new to success and have a long way to go to be anywhere near our trophy haul. The caveat to all of this is that United must look at themselves. United should be focused on sorting out their own problems rather than conspiring to ruin other teams’ seasons. I think it would be really small-minded to roll over so that Liverpool may not win the title. I never want my team to lose, let alone in a derby. Besides, bizarrely, two wins this week will put us back with a strong chance of top four. City winning a domestic treble would be a fine achievement if they were to do it, although I’m certain that they’d trade the League Cup for a proper shot at the Champions League. I was pleased to see them crash out last week, meaning our achievements in 1999 remain unmatched. This season has been turbulent and hard to enjoy. It started under a cloud and then slowly built to calamity in December whilst City and Liverpool blew everyone away. That has been painful. The uplift initially under Ole Gunnar Solskjær was blissful but impossible to sustain, there are many squad issues which have been there for many seasons because of poor recruitment and the club prioritising profit over football.