If Sunday’s whirlwind Premier League collision between Liverpool and Manchester City did not tell us which of the two will win the title, it did confirm just how far they are ahead of the rest.
This is the environment Erik ten Hag will walk into when, as expected, he joins Manchester United this summer.
As Liverpool and City have broken new ground in excellence recently, United have withered almost to the point of competitive irrelevance. With this in mind, the task ahead of United’s fifth full-time manager since Sir Alex Ferguson is huge.