Gary Neville has warned Manchester City's players they will continue to hear chants of "cheats" and claimed a "huge cloud" will linger over the Premier League for months. The warning came after City beat Liverpool 3-0 at Anfield on Sunday afternoon, their first match against the Reds since being found guilty of over 100 breaches of the Premier League's financial regulations across a nine-season period.
Hostile chants and a pivotal red card
Enzo Maresca's squad faced repeated abuse as they took to the pitch, with the Kop delivering chants of "cheats" during the closing stages. Ryan Gravenberch's sending off for two yellow cards just past the hour mark proved pivotal as City scored three times through Erling Haaland, Jeremy Doku and Rayan Cherki to preserve their unbeaten start to the campaign.
Speaking on Sky Sports during the match, Neville said: "That is brutal. The players out there are being called cheats. That's one of the worst things you can be called. That one could catch on across the grounds and across the country until the punishment does come in."
Neville's post-match verdict
After the match, Neville added: "This is the first Manchester City game I've done since the guilty verdicts were handed out a few weeks ago. I've said, if you could take me off Manchester City games moving forward for the next few months, until the (appeal) has been heard, I'd be absolutely delighted!"
He praised City's performance but noted the wider context: "To come and win at Anfield is really difficult. We should be eulogising over them without a 'but' or any hesitation. But there is that thing in the back in your mind, they've done a brilliant job here today, they've obviously dominated the game in the last 20 minutes, from the red card onwards."
Neville highlighted the defensive display: "They've dug in, players like (Gianluigi) Donnarumma, (Ruben) Dias, (Elliot) Anderson, in that first half were excellent and stood strong as a group, senior players."
Cloud over the league
He warned of the consequences if the verdicts are upheld: "But at the end of the game, it's quite hard, because you're imagining if these guilty verdicts are confirmed in January, February, that Manchester City are not going to be in the position that they're in, and there's going to be a huge cloud hanging over the whole league. This is not good for the Premier League right now, that's what I've just recognised today. This is really bad for the Premier League and it's going to continue for a few months."
City deny any wrongdoing. After the final whistle, Haaland said: "Every single person part of Man City, and every fan, this is a lovely moment that will stay with us for a long time. It was tough, it was hard but we showed amazing character from back to front. So proud of everyone. It's always tough to come here, if you look at the record it's tough. With the Pep and Klopp era it was tough for both teams, always has been. Important to stay strong mentally, stick together and do what you can do something about and the thing we can do something about is to play good football and fight together. That's the only thing we can do."
Elliot Anderson praised his team-mates' determination, adding: "I think we've shown real togetherness and fight. It's a tough place to come and it's challenging and we really stuck together out there, fought for each other and played well as well. I think we've shown courage here."
