Liverpool thrashed Chelsea in Jurgen Klopp’s 200th Premier League win.
Diogo Jota broke the deadlock on 25 minutes with a superb solo effort, turning through the visitors’ defence before wrongfooting Djorde Petrovic.
The Reds doubled their advantage before half-time when Conor Bradley opened his account with a surging run before firing into Petrovic’s far corner.
A third should have followed for Klopp’s side when Jota was fouled in the penalty area but Darwin Nunez crashed his kick against the righthand post.
Dominik Szoboszlai eventually extended the hosts’ lead by meeting a cross from Bradley in the second half to head home in front of The Kop with ease.
The visitors shortened their deficit through substitute Christopher Nkunku turning Carney Chukwuemeka’s ball into the penalty area past Alisson.
But Luis Diaz restored the three-goal cushion by sliding home to meet Nunez’s cross in Wednesday’s dress rehearsal for the Carabao Cup final.
Here were the key talking points from Anfield:
Bradley throws Klopp a conundrum
It takes something truly special for a Liverpool player to gain their own chant.
Whether an iconic moment or numerous years of unstinting service, the right to have your name sung by The Kop is a privilege which must be earned.
Some have gone through their Anfield careers without gaining such audible approval. After just 14 games, however, Conor Bradley has achieved that.
The 20-year-old’s name was chanted with gusto after he threw Jurgen Klopp a curveball with a first goal and two assists in the Carabao Cup final dry run.
Defensively, too, he shackled Raheem Sterling, the club’s last young player to both poach and provide in a Premier League game, with remarkable ease.
Between his landmark moment and the double assist, the Northern Irishman has racked up six goal involvements in his previous four games for Liverpool.
Trent Alexander-Arnold’s return from injury appeared to signal a beginning of the end for Bradley’s starting prospects – or at least that was the theory.
Now, Klopp faces a conundrum of how best to fit both into his starting line-up.
Nunez stuck between genius and insanity
They say there is a fine line between genius and insanity.
Darwin Nunez seems to traverse it multiple times per game after Liverpool’s No.9 inexplicably failed to find the target against the lacklustre Londoners.
Fresh from his FA Cup strike against Norwich, he appeared in fine form when peppering Djorde Petrovic’s goal at will in a typically lively first half display.
But the Uruguayan should have built on his side’s commanding lead shortly before the interval, only to crash a penalty kick against the righthand post.
Somewhat fittingly, he would enter the history books as the first player to hit the woodwork four times in a top-flight game since records began in 2003/04.
What he lacked in finesse, Nunez made up for in an assist; pinging a sublime ball to the far post for Luis Diaz to slide home Liverpool’s fourth of the night.
Sheer unpredictability is what makes the 24-year-old such a potent threat but even by those standards, this felt like one of his wilder outings in front of goal.
Did Reds dodge a bullet with Caicedo?
Moises Caicedo’s first outing at Anfield since snubbing a British transfer record move last summer was always going to be an intriguing prospect.
Five months earlier, the Ecuadorian had been at the heart of a transfer tug-of-war between Liverpool and Chelsea in which the latter ultimately triumphed.
Klopp’s remedy to missing out on the enforcer was to deploy his erstwhile Brighton teammate Alexis Mac Allister in a slightly unfamiliar holding role.
Yet the makeshift option comfortably bested the marquee signing as the World Cup winner produced one of his most complete performances to date.
Mac Allister won eight tackles, trumping the combined haul of Caicedo, Enzo Fernandez and Conor Gallagher. and won a match high of 11 duels from 18.
Beyond that, he made four recoveries; again putting his opposite number in the shade, alongside a 91% pass completion while also creating one chance.
Neither the Argentine’s start to life at Anfield nor Caicedo’s formative months at Stamford Bridge have been what could be considered as plain sailing.
Even so, Klopp may look back on Liverpool’s failure to sign the latter as a bullet dodged rather than a missed opportunity in light of this encounter.