Jürgen Klopp has praised the efforts of his young guns following their promotion to first-team duties and insisted: 'the future of Liverpool looks really nice'.

The German included six Academy graduates in his starting line-up last weekend as the Reds ran out 2-1 winners away to Bournemouth in the Barclays Premier League.

It is not the first time Klopp has looked to the likes of Sheyi Ojo, Brad Smith and Connor Randall either, with cup competitions having provided plenty of opportunities for the club's talented youngsters to show their potential this season.

When asked about the progress of those hopefuls at a press conference to preview his side's midweek meeting with Everton, the boss spoke of a recent training session in which they reached levels he could barely believe.

But, in the same breath, he challenged them to now work hard enough to ensure that Sunday's outing on the south coast will not be their last in the senior team.

Klopp told reporters: "The big steps, they made in training, but then we have to prove what we say!

"A few weeks ago we had a session only with young players in wonderful weather, a really, really good session.

"And after the session I brought them together and said, 'I'm not sure if it's okay that I say this, I'm not sure it will help, but pfft, what quality - I can't believe it!'

"So now we have to answer the question why only a few of [them] will go through [to the first team]. They have all the skills they need, all the talent.

"As long as they are here, I have to prove it sometimes that I really think what I say. I was really pleased for them to give them that opportunity and it was how you saw, really intensive and really good against a team who will play Premier League football next year.

"They trained one or two times in this line-up so that's really difficult but the world is not perfect so we cannot give them a game with everybody knowing before that we will win 5-0 to get self-confidence.

"They did really well and I was really pleased for them, it was a big step for them in their self-understanding for sure. Now it's their job to work that hard that it'll be not the only game."

LFCTV GO subscribers can watch the manager's press conference in full

A spate of injuries around Christmas meant Klopp was forced to recall a number of young players from season-long loan spells a well as promote from the Academy in order to bolster his ranks.

But the boss admits now that the crisis his team faced was helpful in the long term, given that it exposed him to several players whom he might otherwise not have had the chance to look at closely.

The knowledge Klopp has gained from the many training sessions and matches that made up a difficult festive period have also left him absolutely certain that the future of the club is a bright one.

He continued: "We have had in training sessions, real important sessions, around 45 players! That helped a lot.

"In the moment, the situtation was sometimes really difficult, but then we were always forced to find a solution, which was always to use players that were already in the club.

"After January, when we brought a few guys back from being on loan somewhere in the country, we had a few more players and it was really exciting to see all of them.

"It's not only one session you look and you make a judgement, I need to see more and more often. The one thing is to give them the opportunity, the other thing - that's much more important - is to use the opportunity, and that's what they did. All of them.

"You saw Cameron Brannagan in the Capital One Cup and he is an outstanding talent and it was the same with Pedro Chirivella when you saw him at West Ham [in the FA Cup] - you have a few more players from the younger ones.

"We could give them the opportunity but it's up to the players to use it. If they can make the steps we are always, minimum, 60-70 per cent responsible for this because it's easy to say it's the attitude of the player.

"Most of them, nearly all of them, have a perfect attitude, so it's about how we handle them, how we train them, and how often we can give them the opportunity to play in different teams. So this season was, for this, in the end, perfect.

"This hard way we had to go [helped us] to learn about these young boys. The future of Liverpool looks nice, really nice, with all these young players.

"But at the end we are a big club with big targets, big goals, big aims, and so we need to win big games and you cannot always bring young players.

"You have to educate them, then when we can we have to show that we trust them, and they have to deliver. That's how it is."