FIVE THINGS WE LEARNED from Liverpool’s 4-0 win over Leicester

Liverpool got a positive workout in the humid heat of Singapore and eased to a 4-0 win over Championship side Leicester, with 24 players getting much-needed game time.

The Reds scored three goals in eight first-half minutes to put the game out of the Foxes’ sight after a strong start by Enzo Maresca’s team.

Darwin Nunez opened the scoring on 30 minutes with a tap-in, before 18-year-old Bobby Clark scored a tidy finish to make it two on 35 minutes and then Diogo Jota nodded home a third just three minutes later.

Jurgen Klopp made 10 changes at the break and one of those, another teenager Ben Doak, headed home Liverpool’s fourth in the second half.

Mail Sport was at the Singapore National Stadium and here are our five key takeaways…

Jurgen Klopp’s side cruised to a 4-0 win over Leicester in their latest pre-season match

Youngster Ben Doak, left, was among Liverpol’s scorers at the Singapore National Stadium

Lessons learned from last year

While the majority of the Premier League’s top half have spent the last fortnight in the Far East and around the United States, this was Liverpool’s first friendly outside of Europe.

Jurgen Klopp learned lessons from last season in which the management team pointed to a two-week jaunt to Asia as a big reason for the extremely below-par season.

After jetting around the world and missing key preparation time in Thailand and Singapore last year, Klopp felt his team were playing catch-up with fitness during a subsequent camp in Austria. They never really did catch up.

‘Would I do anything different in pre-season? I wouldn’t go in the first week to Asia,’ he has said. ‘We learn from these kinds of things.’

And so the Reds spent last week playing two games in front of limited crowds in Germany and working on fitness, with a few days of work at the AXA Training Centre either side.

Klopp invited Liverpool legends out to the tour to reduce the commercial demands on players

Martin Skrtel, Lucas Leiva and John Aldridge are among the Liverpool legends out in Singapore

Klopp also invited several Liverpool ‘legends’ to Singapore to take the strain off his first-team players in terms of commercial duties and meeting fans. Lucas Leiva, John Barnes, Gary McAllister, Ian Rush and John Aldridge are among those out here.

In a bid to reduce tiredness and jetlag stresses, Liverpool’s players are operating on ‘tour time’. Instead of being seven hours ahead of the UK as Singapore is, the Reds have changed their watches to just three hours in front of back home.

It means they sat down for an evening meal at 1am one evening and this 5pm kick-off local time was actually 2pm to them. It will allow Klopp’s side to need less time in their tour recovery and thus more chance to focus on the new Premier League season.

New No 6 is a must… now 

So it turns out Klopp was right, of course. He said Liverpool need midfield reinforcements to seriously challenge this term after Fabinho looks set to follow former captain Jordan Henderson to Saudi Arabia – and he is right.

Curtis Jones played in the No 6 role here, a position he played well for England in their Under 21 European Championship success in Georgia earlier this summer. 

And though he is accomplished in possession, is Jones disciplined enough to play there full-time?

He is a talented midfielder and certainly would not disgrace himself but Klopp’s public cry for a new signing perhaps strengthens Southampton’s bargaining position when it comes to Liverpool’s second bid for 19-year-old Romeo Lavia.

Trent Alexander-Arnold has played there previously this pre-season but, due to an injury to highly-rated youngster Conor Bradley, the Englishman switched to his more conventional role here. Saying that, though, Alexander-Arnold spent most of the game in central areas.

James McConnell played the second half in that role and Klopp said of the 18-year-old: ‘The boy James on the No 6 is just a joy to watch, he had never played the position before but he throws his heart on to the pitch.’

Curtis Jones started at No.6 in Singapore but may not be trusted in big Premier League games

The new boys add a different dimension

Liverpool’s two summer signings played a half each and both Alexis Mac Allister and Dominik Szoboszlai look just what Jurgen Klopp has been missing for years: direct, creative and threatening midfielders.

Even in the Champions League and Premier League-winning sides, Klopp favoured a workhouse and industrious flat midfield, but Mac Allister will add much-needed goals and assists from deeper areas. At just £35million, he could be the signing of the summer.

Hungarian Szoboszlai returned after rolling his ankle and missing a few days of on-pitch work last week and played just over half an hour. 

The 22-year-old’s set-piece delivery is venomous and maybe Alexander-Arnold will have a competitor in free-kicks and corners.

Alexis Mac Allister provided a creative spark for Liverpool during the first half of the match

Dominik Szoboszlai played 30 minutes in the second half and made a lasting impression

Darwin is evolving into a real force 

Darwin Nunez has been the standout of Liverpool’s pre-season, with another goal here adding to two clinical finishes in Germany last week.

After a below-par first season in England – the narrative constantly comparing him to Erling Haaland certainly did not help – Nunez looks ready to kick on and perhaps target a decent goal tally this term.

Klopp said: ‘The signs Darwin showed last season were really good. Injuries, red card, were not helpful at the start. The ticket into the team will be the readiness to defend.’

The Uruguayan was in the right place at the right time to tap home after Diogo Jota’s attempt was parried into Nunez’s path.

Jota was perhaps the man of the match for Liverpool, with a clever glanced headed goal adding to his assist and he could be an important player this term.

Cody Gakpo and Luis Diaz played the second half after Jota, Nunez and Mo Salah went off at the break, which showcases the Reds’ attacking depth.

Darwin Nunez continued his standout pre-season and looks ready to kick-on for Liverpool

Leicester’s new regime

A word on Leicester. No one really expected them to be in the Championship but here we are. And though this was a bruising defeat in the scoreline, there are plenty of positive takeaways for Enzo Maresca’s new-look team.

Leicester have lost Harvey Barnes and James Maddison to big transfer fees this summer, while senior professionals Jonny Evans and Ryan Bertrand left for nothing. Jamie Vardy did not play here, while experienced defender Conor Coady also missed out through injury.

Mads Hermansen did little wrong in goal, and the young Dane looked accomplished in possession, which will have pleased Pep Guardiola-schooled Maresca, who joined Leicester after winning the Treble as Manchester City assistant manager last term.

Harry Winks looked good in midfield, in the first half especially, and Leicester looked bright in their positional play. On Saturday, Maresca said the main thing he wants to see is his players buying into his ‘ideas’ – and they seem to be doing that.

After the Italian’s last season ended in triumph in Istanbul and now this trip to exotic Thailand and Singapore, the next assignments will bring the Foxes back down to earth: Coventry at home in the Championship next Sunday, then a trip to Burton in the EFL Cup.

Enzo Maresca’s side suffered a bruising defeat in Singapore but will take some positives away