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Football

27th Dec 2015

Liverpool legend reveals secret to club’s seeming transformation after Watford thrashing

Showing character

Kevin McGillicuddy

Something had to change.

Jurgen Klopp is still trying to get to grips with life in the Premier League, and if he ever needed a sign of what an odd title race it can be, then he’ll have come closer to figuring it out in the last week.

After losing 3-0 to Watford seven days ago, his Liverpool side went and beat the Premier League leaders Leicester City on Saturday afternoon 1-0 at Anfield.

From zeroes to heroes it seemed in just six days, and Mark Lawrenson thinks he knows how Liverpool managed to look like a totally different side in the space of less than a week.

Writing in his Liverpool Echo column, the former Reds defender reckons a showdown between various players in the dressing room at Vicarage Road after last week’s loss was the catalyst for Saturday’s result

“The away dressing room wasn’t a happy place at Vicarage Road last Sunday.

“I’m reliably informed that as Liverpool traipsed back into the bowels of the stadium, some of the senior professionals took it upon themselves to declare one thing.”

“That simply CANNOT happen again.”

“They simply can’t allow teams to run over them and knock them out of their stride. The older players realise that’s a problem. And it has been a problem for a while.”

Brendan Rodgers often praised the ‘character’ of his side despite terrible losses and Klopp has used the word once or twice.

But finally on Saturday Liverpool did look much more composed, with an increased work-rate among the players from back to front as they stopped the Leicester goal-machine – led by Jamie Vardy and Riyad Mahrez – from scoring for the first time this season.

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