Boss delighted with Reds' depth at full-back
Jürgen Klopp intends to make the most of Jon Flanagan's return to full fitness in order to keep his full-backs fresh for the remainder of the season.
The Scouse defender was drafted into Liverpool's starting XI in place of Alberto Moreno for the convincing victory over Manchester City at Anfield that came just three days after the sides contested the Capital One Cup final.
Flanagan was tasked with shackling a player he knows well in Raheem Sterling, and did so impressively as the Reds ran riot against Manuel Pellegrini's team.
But, when asked if the switch was tactical, Klopp said: "No. It was because we have Flanno now.
"It was clear that he would play but I didn't know exactly if he would play instead of Clyney or Alberto, but Alberto in the first half of the final got a really bad knock.
"[Alberto]'s a hard boy so he can always play, he is always available, but in the end it was clear that we [would] do it like this.
"I know Flanno played in the left full-back position too but after this long time, I didn't want to play him on the other side.
"He was on the right, Clyney plays left, so it was not, 'bring Flanno against Raheem and take him out of the game'. That was coincidence."
Klopp also praised the versatility of the right-backs at his disposal, with both Flanagan and Nathaniel Clyne capable of featuring on the left-hand side, as the latter did against City.
The German did jokingly admit, however, that Clyne's ability to cross on his left foot may well need some work.
"They can all play this, especially Clyney and Flanno can play on this wing. That's good, you need the possibility to change things," he added.
"Clyney played there for the second time since I’ve been here. If we were to do this more often we should talk more about offensive moments with the right foot on the left wing because I saw no cross in moments when we could cross.
"But that's normal, you can’t get everything. We had three days between the games, we had no training, so we said, 'come on, go'.
"You give all the information you have to the players so you think, defend well and if they have the opportunity, then go [forward]. We should do more on this [attacking] but we haven't done it until now."