Liverpool have one foot in the Champions League final after thrashing Roma 5-2 on Tuesday night. Roma managed to get a couple of goals back after being dominated for pretty much the entirety of the match, losing their heads and failing to defend.
Manchester United fans are clinging on to the hope that Roma can have a better showing during the second leg of the semifinal, seeing as how they overturned a 4-1 deficit against a much better Barcelona team in the previous round. But evidence from Anfield suggests that the game against the Spanish side was Roma's final gasp and that they are now spent.
United supporters are left with the horrible prospect of having rivals Liverpool possibly winning the European Cup for a sixth time -- a number that would double the total they have claimed.
Just a few weeks earlier, many United fans were cheering the Scousers on against Manchester City -- believing that Pep Guardiola's side had a much better chance of going on to win the competition than Liverpool did. If Jurgen Klopp could knock out City, it seemed almost certain they would lose against one of the European giants in the next round. But then Roma beat Barcelona and set the wheels of this torturous scenario in motion.
While City's wealthy owners have certainly sharpened the rivalry between the Mancunian clubs, a few years of competition do not come close to matching the decades of rivalry between United and Liverpool.
United supporters obviously aren't particularly fond of City, but the intensity of those feelings is nothing like the hatred felt for Liverpool. Younger supporters, however, may wonder what the fuss is all about, given you'd have to be in your late 30s to have any real memories of the last time Liverpool were the best team in England.
It's been 28 years since they last won the league. Yet in that time, they've been crowned champions of Europe once with a potential third final appearance on the way.
By contrast, United have won the English title 13 times since Liverpool last did, yet have only won the Champions League twice and haven't been near the final since they last played in it in 2011.