When Liverpool were playing turbo-charged football in the first three months of the season, there were plenty of naysayers to keep the optimism in check.

“You can’t play like that over 38 games,” they said. “There will come a point when you have to grind out victories, and then we’ll see how good they really are.”

So exciting was Jurgen Klopp’s front three, the temptation to either ignore such doom-laden prophecies or offer a gentle slap across the forehead of the balloon poppers was irresistible.

Instead, as the festive season approaches, it is in indeed party time for the voices of bleakness.

The trainee Ebeneezers can raise their celebratory glass of water; put on their Best of Radiohead LP and gorge on the opening two acts of Les Miserables. Yes, you were right. Usain Bolt can’t win a marathon; Lewis Hamilton won’t win a World Championship without dropping gears on the trickiest bends; the Grand National is indeed won by the horse demonstrating greatest stamina rather than speed.