Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp hailed the spirit shown by his side to overcome Bournemouth on Saturday – and edge his side closer to the Premier League title.
Liverpool are now just three wins to clinch the trophy, though they were made to sweat against Eddie Howe's side at Anfield. As well as the three points, the win also saw Liverpool set a new record of 22 consecutive home league wins.
Bournemouth took the lead through Callum Wilson after just nine minutes, but Liverpool edged themselves in front through goals from Mo Salah and Sadio Mane.
Klopp was left relieved that Liverpool earned the three points, and expressed his frustration at the failure to award a free for a perceived foul on Joe Gomez.
"Very good performance," the German told BT Sport after the game.
"But a very difficult start obviously, a situation like the first goal really doesn't help obviously from my point of view is 100pc a foul, nothing else but it shows the problem with VAR as well because the ref doesn't see it.
"I'm 100% Mike Dean was next to me and he was like have a look, and then the VAR says it's not clear and obvious."
Despite the early setback, Liverpool bounced back and the quality of their performance was a real source of satisfaction for Klopp.
"But then, we wanted to fight back before the game so then we had to fight really back, we did that put, them under pressure, did a lot of good stuff, had really good situations, scored wonderful goals, played really good football,"
"The set pieces were still there, that's always a big strength of Bournemouth so we had to be 100pc concentrated. We were, so we deserved the three points - that's all I wanted."
While attention will inevitably remain on Liverpool's attempts to win the league for the first time in 30 years, Klopp remained adamant that their immediate focus will be on trying to overcome the 1-nil deficit in their Champions League last-16 tie with Atletico Madrid.
"It's Atleti, 100%," Klopp said of Liverpool's focus.
"That's a tough one and of course they will not come here and try and play a friendly game. It will be the opposite.
"Today helps, maybe 1 or 2 players coming back we will see and then we have a good lineup and with Anfield, we try to change it."
