A late penalty converted by Burnley’s Ashley Barnes ended Liverpool’s 68 match unbeaten run last week but, believe it or not, the Reds’ achievement is not a Premier League record.
The four year domination that Liverpool enjoyed at Anfield was some run, but which club in the competition’s history can better that? Well read on. The SBOTOP team has put together a list of the top five…and we’ve discovered who has built the strongest fortress of all time.
Five
Manchester United: 35
1994-1996
Sir Alex Ferguson had been head coach at Manchester United for six seasons before he eventually won the first of 13 league titles at Old Trafford. In fact, legend has it that he was one match away from the sack in 1989. After a winless streak of seven games his team headed to Nottingham Forest for an FA Cup tie they were expected to lose. But a Mark Robins goal gave the Red Devils a victory; and the rest is history.
By 1994, Sir Alex already had two league titles under his belt and his ‘Class of 92’ players including David Beckham, Gary and Phil Neville, Paul Scholes and Nicky Butt were already blossoming into superstars. They went through the whole of the 1995/6 season unbeaten at home, and their sequence was only ended when Chelsea won 2-1 at Old Trafford in November 1996.
Four
Manchester United: 36
1998-2000
After losing the league title to Arsenal in 1998, United looked to be struggling the following season when they lost at home to Middlesbrough. But that defeat turned out to be just a blip as the Red Devils went on to achieve a historic treble of League, FA Cup and Champions League in 1999. They remained unbeaten at home until Liverpool grabbed a win Old Trafford in December of that year.
Current United boss Ole Gunnar Solskjaer was a key part of the Red Devils 1999 treble winning side, scoring the crucial goal in the Champions League final, and he has called on his current crop of players to draw on that inspiration. His team’s Premier League 2021 results don’t yet match up to the stars of yesteryear but they are showing promise.
Three
Manchester City: 37
2010 – 2012
From the moment the Abu Dhabi United Group took over Manchester City in 2008, life in the Sky Blue half of Manchester changed forever. United’s legendary boss Sir Alex Ferguson called them the ‘noisy neighbours’ but he new what was coming as Sheik Mansour elevated his rivals to be the best and most powerful club in the Premier League within four short years.
And 11 years after Manchester United’s treble winning team set the league’s unbeaten home record, the Sky Blues broke it. They went 37 games unbeaten at the Etihad, including the dramatic title winning match against QPR in 2012, when City went into injury time 2-1 down; but goals from Edin Dzeko and Sergio Aguero wrote head coach Roberto Mancini’s name into Manchester City folklore.
Fergie had the last laugh though, when his side grabbed a 93rd minute winner to end City’s run the following December.
Two
Liverpool: 68
2017-2021
A Champions League title and a 2018/19 Premier League runners up prize signalled that Jurgen Klopp’s Liverpool were ready to challenge the Sky Blues’ dominance; and Anfield, for so long in the 70s and 80s a feared destination for visitors, once again became a fortress.
In their 2019/20 title winning season, the Reds won their first 17 matches at home, until Burnley earned a 1-1 draw at Anfield in July. And the pesky Clarets were at it again last week, being the first team to win in the league away to Liverpool for almost four years.
The defeat to Sean Dyche’s men also signalled the first time a Jurgen Klopp side had failed to score for four consecutive games since his Mainz team did just that in the 2006/7 Bundesliga season. The latest Premier League 2021 betting odds pitch the Reds as second favourites, at around 6.00, to win the title and the champions seem to be back on track, with wins over Spurs and West Ham lifting them to third place. But it will be an uphill task to keep pace with Manchester City, particularly now the Anfield fortress has been breached.
One
Chelsea: 86
2004-2008
Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho during a training session at Stamford Bridge in November 2004
2004 was the year of the great Arsenal Invincibles side, which had gone an entire Premier League season undefeated, but when Arsene Wenger’s brilliant team won 2-1 at Stamford Bridge in February I bet they didn’t think they’d be the last team to emerge from the Bridge victorious for almost five years. Jose Mourinho arrived at the club the following summer and made them almost impossible to beat, indeed they were unbeaten at home as they won back-to-back titles.
The Blues have recently appointed Thomas Tuchel to replace the sacked Frank Lampard in the hope of recapturing former glories. He’s started okay with a home draw with Wolves and then a victory over Burnley…just 84 to go!
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The post Premier League: The Strongest Fortress appeared first on SBOTOP.
