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Alberto Moreno says he’s finally flourishing at Liverpool because he’s now playing for a manager who believes in him.

The resurgent Spanish left-back has revealed how his treatment at the hands of Brendan Rodgers earlier this season left him “raging” after he was relegated to bench duty.

However, Moreno credits the appointment of Jurgen Klopp for transforming his fortunes ahead of Saturday’s crunch clash with Chelsea.

The 23-year-old was rested for the midweek Capital One Cup win over Bournemouth but will return to the starting line up at Stamford Bridge having impressed during the opening weeks of Klopp’s reign.

Moreno is relishing playing for the German having been overlooked by Rodgers for the club’s first five league matches this term with rookie Joe Gomez picked ahead of him.

The £12million signing from Sevilla insists he never contemplated leaving Liverpool before the transfer window shut but admits he felt harshly treated.

“Jurgen talks with me a lot,” Moreno said.

“I do feel he trusts me, he spends a lot of time with me. The fact he has spent so much time with me, I think, shows up in good performances on the field.

“I perhaps felt that Brendan didn’t have quite so much confidence in me, certainly at the start of the season. He told me I was training hard but then I didn’t feature for those first five or six games.

“He said to me that it was still early in the season and that my opportunity would come but after the first game against Stoke, when we kept a clean sheet, he said he wasn’t going to change anything defensively at that point.

“It is true that when I was out of the team I was angry. It never entered my head that I was going to leave as I want to stay forever, but I had this inner anger, a rage almost.

“I felt I was playing well, training well. He told me that I was training well. But I couldn’t see why I wasn’t getting a chance at the beginning.”

Defensive doubts from the former manager

Moreno initially regained his place under Rodgers as a wing-back last month with the former boss always having doubts about his defensive abilities. If Rodgers had had his way in the summer of 2014 Liverpool would have signed Ryan Bertrand from Chelsea instead.

Klopp has shown no such concerns over Moreno, utilising him at left-back, and working with him at Melwood to ensure he knows exactly what’s required.

The new manager’s only complaint has been over the defender’s grasp of English with Lucas Leiva having to act as a translator. The language lessons have now been cranked up to four times per week.

“I think I am playing well,” Moreno said.

“I feel like I have fully integrated into the team again. Not being in the side for the first five or six games just inspired to me work as hard as I could in training so I could fight for my place in the starting XI.

“The manager has a huge passion for the game which I think I do. He wants you to express yourself on the field. He wants you to offer not 100% but 200% when you are performing and I think I offer that. It fits in with me.

“He really wants me to learn English as quickly as possible so he can get his ideas over. I have to brush up on my English.

“Through Lucas, he tells me to get forward, to be attack-minded. When I am defending, he tells me to be aggressive and stay tight to the person that I am marking. When I am going forward, not to be scared or play with tension and to be relaxed in possession of the ball.”

A clean slate for all

Moreno isn’t the only member of the squad who has been energised by Klopp’s arrival with the likes of Mamadou Sakho, Emre Can and Lucas Leiva also much improved. It’s been a clean slate for them all.

“The people of the city were very excited when he was coming in. It was the same for us too. It transmitted to us,” he said.

“We know that Klopp is a great manager, an important manager and a very good coach. We also knew it was important for the club, a great change.

“I am confident that it will come good. It didn’t start so well with the three draws but then we got out first win. I am convinced sooner or later things are going to go well for the club and we will get many more victories under him.

“I think that it has been a 100% change. Everything is totally different. He spoke to all the players and the first thing he said to us was that he was going to judge things on what he saw and what he felt. He told us we all started from zero. He said the present had nothing to do with the past and the previous regime.”

Appreciation from the fans

Moreno showcased the upturn in his form with a potentially goal-saving tackle on Southampton’s Sadio Mane in last weekend’s 1-1 draw at Anfield which earned him a thunderous ovation from supporters.

Klopp has already succeeded in tightening Liverpool up defensively and Moreno has benefited from his organisational skills.

“I love it when something like that happens,” he said. “When the fans get behind you and congratulate you for a good piece of play like in that case the tackle, it’s amazing.

“It’s almost why you go out on the field to perform well and do things well for the fans. The other reason I go out on the field is to defend well and put in challenges like that. I know that my first job is to defend, and I think I’m much better defensively this year,

“That part of my game is primarily what I’m in the team for, but as well I still have that desire and love of going forward when I get the chance.

“I haven’t just learned to defend under Klopp, I‘ve been defending since I was a kid and learnt the art of defending before he arrived.

“But what is true is that he spends a lot of time on the training field on how we set up – not just defensively but also where we are position wise in the middle of the field and also in attack.

“Each training session is quite tactical, we cover a lot of positional work and strategy as well. I think you can start to see that on the field where we are working as one and we seem very united as a group.”

London calling

That unity will be crucial at Stamford Bridge as Liverpool look to pile the pressure on under-fire Chelsea boss Jose Mourinho. The Londoners are three points adrift of the ninth placed Reds having already suffered five league defeats so far this season.

“It’s true they are struggling at the moment, but you know you have to remember this is still Chelsea we are talking about, we’re still talking about the current champions,” Moreno added.

“They’ve still got one of the best managers around and have still got a squad packed with great players, so just when you least expect it they will recover their form and go shooting up the league table.

“That’s all the more reason why we have to go there and be prepared and be very careful. We have to go there with the mentality to win the game and try to score the goals we need to do that on their ground.”

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