Jurgen Klopp thrills at return of normal service as Liverpool rediscover their composure

For the first time in two-and-a-half weeks, Jurgen Klopp quickened his stride, twirled his right hand, took a little skip and punched the air three times to roars of acclaim.

The previous four dates on Klopp’s farewell tour had seen no call for his trademark celebration as his team’s ambitions suffered a series of jolts. But this time he walked away happy and the fist pumps were back — a signal that Liverpool were back in their groove and still alive in this Premier League title race.

A 3-1 win over Fulham at Craven Cottage took Liverpool level with leaders Arsenal on 74 points, one clear of champions Manchester City who have a game in hand. The top two have the chance to extend that lead — Arsenal at home to Chelsea on Tuesday evening, Liverpool at Everton 24 hours later — before City play again at Brighton & Hove Albion on Thursday.

“An interesting race,” Klopp called it afterwards. There were no bombastic statements from Klopp. He quietly spoke about needing to take care of business, “to try to win as many games somehow possible”, and hoping to get a little help from elsewhere.

For months, there has been a sense of drama around Klopp’s team: wild, chaotic matches, not least the two against Manchester United at Old Trafford (a 4-3 defeat in the FA Cup quarter-final and a 2-2 draw in the Premier League). But this was the type of controlled, composed Liverpool performance that has been a rarity of late. At this stage of the race, when tensions and nerves are heightened, composure is essential.

So is individual quality. Liverpool had not shown enough of that in recent weeks; far too many goalscoring opportunities have been squandered or snatched at.

And then up stepped Trent Alexander-Arnold in the 32nd minute against Fulham and curled a beautiful free kick beyond Bernd Leno’s outstretched palm and inside the near post. It makes quite a difference when you have a player who can do that.

Opta measured Liverpool’s expected goals (xG) value for the entire game at precisely 1.00, by far their lowest in 17 matches in all competitions since the 3-1 defeat at Arsenal in early February. But as Alexander-Arnold stood over that free kick, it felt as if everyone inside Craven Cottage knew exactly what was going to happen next. It was an expected goal of another type.

Alexander-Arnold was enjoying an excellent season before injury initially struck in January. In his absence there were some superb contributions from his young deputy Conor Bradley, but Alexander-Arnold’s passing, crossing and (less frequently) his shooting bring a different dimension to this Liverpool team.

“It’s super important,” Klopp said of his vice-captain’s return. “But, for example, one of the shooting stars of this season is Conor Bradley, who played the position and played in a few games where we all thought, ‘Oh wow. What was that?!’ But nobody is like Trent. Nobody is like Trent. The way we play with him can be different, so yes it’s super helpful and I’m really happy about that.”

Klopp was happy about many things. But essentially it boiled down to three: establishing control of the game, taking chances when in the ascendancy and maintaining control after that.

If Liverpool had done that over the previous weeks, they would be clear of Arsenal and Manchester City. In terms of all-round play, it would be hard to call this a better performance than that at Old Trafford a fortnight earlier. The difference was composure.

That composure went missing for a period before half-time as they offered Fulham a way back into the game — an invitation that Timothy Castagne accepted in first-half stoppage time.

It was a bad time to concede a goal, but half-time allowed Liverpool to regroup and refocus without further damage being done.

Whatever Klopp said at the interval, his players seemed more certain of themselves. Wataru Endo, Harvey Elliott, Ryan Gravenberch, Cody Gakpo and Diogo Jota all had a greater say in the second period.

Gravenberch has been inconsistent since his arrival on Merseyside last August, showing both the qualities that earned him a move to Bayern Munich at the age of 20 and the weaknesses that led them to sell him a year later. But from the moment he restored Liverpool’s lead with an exquisite curling shot from the edge of the penalty area, picked out by Elliott, he seemed to grow in confidence and influence.

Gravenberch celebrates scoring their side’s second (Zac Goodwin/PA Images via Getty Images)

Klopp made a point about needing to use Liverpool’s squad strength, with this their seventh out of nine matches in 28 days since the last international break. The concern lately has been that too many players have either looked short of rhythm following a period on the sidelines or exhausted by too much football. Gravenberch and Gakpo haven’t always seized their opportunities when starting matches this season, but this time they did.

The other real beneficiary was Jota.

Unlike Alexander-Arnold, the forward’s stock seemed to rise in his absence due to the errant finishing of others, most notably Darwin Nunez. But on his first start in two months, Jota illustrated the combination of intelligence, ingenuity, sharp movement and confident finishing that makes him Liverpool’s most reliable centre-forward.

Jota had been lively for an hour but was just about to leave the pitch, as part of a triple change, when Gakpo sent him clear of the offside trap on 72 minutes. It was the type of opportunity Liverpool’s other forwards have missed far too often lately, but Jota took it confidently, his last act before making way for Nunez.

Jota converts Liverpool’s third beyond poor Leno (John Powell/Liverpool FC via Getty Images)

There has been a vulnerability about Liverpool in recent weeks — a feeling that, even when ahead, opponents can still sense a way back into the game. But on this occasion Virgil van Dijk and Jarell Quansah kept Fulham at arm’s length. From the moment Gravenberch made it 2-1, the outcome was never really in doubt.

Five games to go, then: Everton away, West Ham United away, Tottenham Hotspur home, Aston Villa away, Wolverhampton Wanderers home. How many more times will we see Klopp grinning from ear to ear and pumping his fists at the final whistle? Goodison Park on Wednesday? London Stadium on Saturday?

Win those two and the gloom that has gathered over Anfield over the last fortnight will give way to a surge of renewed belief.

(Top photo: Zac Goodwin/PA Images via Getty Images)