Premier League Sunday: Liverpool vent at Man Utd tactics as Arsenal and Aston Villa win again

Erik ten Hag was proud of Manchester United’s dogged display in a hard-fought 0-0 draw at Anfield that ended with Liverpool skipper Virgil van Dijk claiming only one team tried to win.

Liverpool's Ibrahima Konate and Manchester United's Scott McTominay battle for the ball.

Liverpool had an eye-watering 34 shots across the match and United keeper Andre Onana made eight saves, but the hosts could not find a way through. The tense clash ended scoreless and frustrated skipper Van Dijk said United are “buzzing” to have left with a point.

“If you see how we played the game, how we obviously had most of the ball and created some opportunities, I think there was only one team that were trying to win the game,” the centre-back told Sky Sports. United boss Ten Hag brushed aside his fellow Dutchman’s comment, simply saying in response that “it’s his opinion” and also gave little away when it came to his view on Diogo Dalot’s sending off for a pair of quickfire bookings for dissent, saying “I will leave the judgement to you”.

But Ten Hag was more forthcoming when it came to his side’s reaction to their alarming back-to-back Old Trafford defeats to Bournemouth and Bayern Munich. “I said that after the game in the dressing room I’m very proud of this team,” added Ten Hag. “We should do this more often. I said this. For instance, Newcastle was also a tough game, we make one mistake, we switch off and concede the goal. But when you stay in the game, when you are disciplined in your game plan, finally it opens up and you can take your chances or get two, three, four passes in after the ball regains, get the switches in and then you can really be more dominant in the game.”

United end the weekend seventh in the Premier League and the end of Liverpool’s 100 per cent home record this season means they are sat in second. Arsenal’s 2-0 win against Brighton in the early kick-off saw them return to the top. The Gunners had to wait until the second half to make their breakthrough when Gabriel Jesus headed home from a corner and they sealed all three points in the 87th minute when Kai Havertz scored from close range.

Aston Villa came from a goal down to extend their winning run to three matches with a 2-1 win over Brentford as both sides finished with 10 men. Brentford hit the front on the stroke of half-time when Keane Lewis-Potter blasted home from a corner but the turning point came after Ben Mee was sent off for a challenge on Leon Bailey following a VAR check. Villa made their man advantage count and equalised when Alex Moreno nodded home before Ollie Watkins found the winner four minutes from time, but the game finished with 10 players for each side after Boubacar Kamara was given a red card for a coming together with Yegor Yarmolyuk.

Mohammed Kudus’ first-half double and Jarrod Bowen’s 10th league goal of the season helped West Ham bounce back from their heavy defeat to Fulham last week with a convincing 3-0 win over Wolves at the London Stadium.