By beating Manchester City at Wembley in their FA Cup semi-final on Saturday, Liverpool have extinguished their rival’s hopes of winning a treble and have simultaneously kept alive their own hopes of securing not only a treble but English football’s first ever quadruple.
Prior to drawing with City the weekend before their progression in the FA Cup, Liverpool won their previous 10 league games, losing only twice in the competition all season. Although second to City by a point, the momentum does marginally seem to be with the Merseyside outfit, who could likely become the first English team to reach the League Cup, FA Cup and Champions League final if they overcome Villarreal in the the semi-finals of the latter.
With Liverpool not expected to drop any more points from here until the end of the season, United beating their arch-rivals on their own turf to inflict severe damage on their Premier League title hopes would be invaluable in an attempt to preserve the illustrious legacies of the 1999 treble winning side.
Whilst Manchester United are considerably far off competing with Liverpool for any silverware, 19 points adrift of them in the league having played one game more, preventing a repetition and surpassing of the greatest feats in the country’s football history should be enough to motivate a bunch of players often seemingly unmotivated at present.
But Harry Maguire claimed that that isn’t in the thinking of Ralf Rangnick’s side.
"I don't think that is part of our motivation if I'm being honest," the United captain claimed when speaking to Sky Sports. "The motivation is going to Anfield and playing against Liverpool and winning a football match and getting three points for this club and the fans."
No doubt, though, the majority of United fans would agree that, even though there is nothing at stake between the sides with regards to beating one another in the league standings this season, victory would come with far more than just three points with regards to halting Liverpool's quadruple bid.
Really, though, it's a nightmare scenario for United and a marker of how far they have declined since the departure of Sir Alex Ferguson nine years ago. Rather than being in the offing for any item of silverware whilst Liverpool have already won one trophy and have a viable change of winning three more, United are instead in a position where they are aiming to bolster their city rivals' title bid at the expense of another nemesis.
But, it must be said, United's chances of taking three points from Anfield are bleak. At the moment, acquisition of even a single point seems as though it would be a miracle, especially given Liverpool haven't lost a league game at home all season.
Somehow, since losing 5-0 in a capitulation against Liverpool at Old Trafford in October towards the tail-end of Ole Gunnar Solskjaer's tenure, things have arguably tumbled further downhill for United after recent woes.
At the weekend, United made tough work of a win against 20th-place, essentially already-relegated Norwich City. If it wasn't for Cristiano Ronaldo stepping up to score a hat-trick, United's 3-2 win could very easily have been a defeat due to a culmination of defensive frailties and a lack of any sustained level.
"We just need to be more compact and we need to find a better balance of what can we do in possession of the ball," Rangnick insisted.
He continued, "Although there might be a lot of defensive work coming up for us tomorrow, we still need to be pro-active. Just sitting and back and hoping, keeping fingers crossed that we are not conceding any goals is not enough against a team like Liverpool."
There are blatantly a mass of problems at United given that they have only won two of their last eight matches in all competitions after the Norwich result, with the other victory also a narrow 3-2 margin host to a Ronaldo hat-trick. With that record, United more or less have one win per month over the past two months.
No matter, given adverse results for both Tottenham Hotspur and Arsenal, there remains a distinct chance that United could still finish inside the top four and qualify for next season's Champions League. However, with Chelsea having reached the FA Cup final, their meeting with United has been moved to next week, meaning United have to navigate three fixtures against 'big six' sides within the space of nine days.
A blow has been dealt as that run commenced due to the emergence that there will be a high chance that Ronaldo may not be involved against Liverpool. In a statement, he revealed devastating news that one of his newborn twins has sadly passed away.
The same absentee list as against Norwich is expected. So Raphael Varane, Luke Shaw and Edinson Cavani all remain sideline, whilst Scott McTominay and Fred's continued absence leaves a threadbare midfield once more.
United were also dealt a scare on Friday morning after Bruno Fernandes was involved in a car accident, but thankfully nobody involved was injured.
"The accident happened on the way to Carrington," Rangnick confirmed. "But as far as I know, nobody was injured. He trained with the team and he was okay, and that's why I think he will also be ok."
Liverpool, by contrast to United, appear to have a clean injury bill as they bid to extend to a run of eight league matches unbeaten against United.
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