Manchester United v Liverpool LIVE: Latest Premier League updates

A retirement game for Casemiro, another reckoning for Erik ten Hag and – maybe even more importantly – an arrival match for Arne Slot. The new Liverpool manager’s biggest win and easiest game so far was the one that was supposed to be the most testing: a 3-0 at his club’s greatest rivals. Then again, this was just another in a modern series of handsome Liverpool victories over Manchester United, even at Old Trafford. The results stay the same even as the faces change. Well, some of the faces.

“We made mistakes and they were very clinical at finishing. All three goals are mistakes from us, individual errors. Liverpool did brilliant in turnover and how they finished.

“It’s clear and deserving for Liverpool. We have to be humble and take this, and improve our game. When you are 2-0 down against Liverpool, they are so brutal that you have to take more risks. That was my assessment. I have to give a compliment to the team because they kept fighting.

“Casemiro knows the game. He will go on, we will go on. He is a great player and we will continue to improve the team and improve the players. He’s showed so often that he is a great character. We have all seen great moments from him, and he will bounce back.

“I don’t have the feeling that we are in the same pattern, because I didn’t see it. We were sometimes open because we took risks. Well done Liverpool, we have to be humble. There are many games to play. We will go for trophies. In two years, we’ve taken two prizes. At the end of the season, we will see where we are. Today it was the first start for Matthijs de Ligt, first start for Joshua Zirkzee. We’ve still got more players not available.”

Old Trafford is scarcely short of traditions, but they have a new one. For the third game of the season, at home to Liverpool and when United have already been beaten by Brighton, they unveil an expensive defensive midfielder, parading him on the pitch before kick-off. For 2022, read 2024. For Casemiro, read Manuel Ugarte.

But only because the solution has become the problem. If United recognised the need to replace Casemiro less than two years after his debut and with two more years remaining on one of football’s worst contracts, the Brazilian couldn’t even occupy the role until the Ugarte era can begin in earnest, until he is eligible. If history is destined to repeat itself, Casemiro’s afternoon contained tragedy and farce. It was sufficiently harrowing, so humiliating to suggest this is the end: except no one else – not even a Saudi Arabian club – will want his salary on their books so United are trapped with a £63m deadweight.

“If you go to Old Trafford, you know there will be tough moments and we fought through that,” Slot tells Sky Sports. “What I really liked was that after we scored a goal that was disallowed, we kept playing the way we were before. We scored some nice goals. A deserved win, I think.

“We always want to press the opponent high. The gameplan was more about when we had the ball – Dominik Szoboszlai has played the last two games from the right and today we played him from the left. Without the ball, we always try to press as high as we can, and we scored a few goals from it today.

“This season, Manchester United are more in a 4-4-2, which is different. I see them working harder if the ball is being played through them. Their full-backs are sometimes really high, so if you win the ball and keep your wingers high, they are in a one-on-one situation. But you need midfielders that can run, and we had three of them today that kept on running. That was one of the main things why we could win today.

“It’s a good start. It’s normal if you win a game like this that the fans are excited, but we’ve still got a lot to prove.”

Mohamed Salah has just had a chat with Sky Sports in which he seemed to suggest that this would be his last season at Liverpool, though the Egyptian forward did clarify later that he’s yet to have talks about a possible renewal of his deal.

“I was coming to the game thinking it could be my last time [at Old Trafford],” Salah said with his contract up next summer. “Nobody has talked to me yet about contracts. I’ll play my last season and then we’ll see. It’s not up to me, nobody has talked to me about it from the club, but we’ll see.”

“It was far from an even game. Liverpool were very, very good, efficient. They looked sharp going forward, looked strong and fitter.

“You can try and dress it up a little bit, but United were shocking. Every time Liverpool went forward, they looked like they were going to score. Not good. There has been a lot of good PR about Manchester United over the last few months about plans for the stadium, blah blah blah, but in a big game against Liverpool, I’m just really disappointed that Manchester United didn’t turn up.

“I’m always surprised when the game is over after 50 or 60 minutes. I know you can have an off day, but for the game to be over after an hour, it’s hard to accept.”

Erik ten Hag will have plenty of time to chew on the gristle with an international break next week. It was pretty awful from his side today. Manuel Ugarte better get up to speed pretty quickly.

Dominant, decisive, devastating – a quite magnificent start to life under Arne Slot continues for Liverpool, a first real statement victory secured in style. Manchester United were the masters of their own downfall, two errors from Casemiro and one from Kobbie Mainoo affording the visitors the chances that they took so superbly.

The away end revels as streaks of emptying red seats appear all around the rest of Old Trafford.