After Liverpool’s victory at the Club World Cup in Qatar, the team still had a long trek back to England before facing up with league rivals Leicester City. Many had speculated that the exertion of the trip to the Middle East would surely hamper Jürgen Klopp’s high-octane tactics at the King Power Stadium. Those pessimistic musings would have dissipated fairly quickly once the match started.
Liverpool were dominant against Leicester. Brendan Rodgers has managed his side to second place in the Premier League (or third if Manchester City beat Wolves today) and the Foxes have looked a significant danger to the Reds’s hopes for a first league title but on the day when it all mattered Liverpool played perhaps their best football yet.
“If you can’t get up for a game for Liverpool Football Club then I don’t think you will get up for many things,” said Robertson.
“The lads love playing games, we get paid to play games, we enjoy playing together and we enjoy going out there and trying to work hard and trying to achieve things and that’s what we did.
“Coming back from Doha, yes it was a long flight and we had two games including extra-time but we came back world champions – if that doesn’t give us a bit of confidence then I really don’t know what would, so we were never worried about that.
“We knew our legs were ready, we’ve done everything right over the last couple of days and it was just about showing it because the excuses were there for people to jump on it, but these lads don’t give anyone any excuses.”
Liverpool’s preparations for the match at Leicester were spot on. From the recovery plan after the victory over Flamengo in the CWC final to the tactics on the pitch at the King Power.
The season is only halfway through but a performance like Liverpool’s on Thursday, with all the surrounding conjecture, against another dangerous side in good form, with a critical points spread on the line, shows that Klopp and his team are the real deal. The title race, while still very much undecided, is firmly in Liverpool’s control.