Rodgers salutes ‘best’ win

Liverpool 2 Hull City 0

And the Liverpool manager also praised Luis Suarez for playing through the pain as the Uruguay forward added another sublime goal to his ever-growing collection to help the Reds to the three points.

After two defeats on the road to Manchester City and Chelsea over the festive period, Liverpool needed to rely on home comforts to get back to winning ways and get back into the top four. And they did so through the brilliance of Suarez yet again, who played with a “bad knock” on his foot that did not stop him scoring a stunning free-kick amid another lively display.

“Luis will always get the plaudits because he is a world-class player,” said Rodgers. “He has a real bad knock on the top of his foot from the Chelsea game and nine out of 10 players would not have played.

“I know from working and managing players that most footballers wouldn’t have played with that. He had a big strapping on it and put himself out there for the team.”

It was Suarez’s determination and that of his team-mates that saw Liverpool past Hull with a display that was far from their best of the season, but one which proved they can win ugly.

“I have told the players that I think that is our best win of the season,” added Rodgers, who has watched his side beat a number of teams in a much more comfortable manner this season.

“In a lot of our games we have been vibrant, had great energy, scored goals and performed well.

“But on the back of the games we have had this period, to play a lot of the same players against a team who won their last league game 6-0 we knew we we’re going to have to tough it out and dig in. We might not have always been at our best, but we scored two great goals, created other opportunities and restricted Hull to no shots on target.”

The Reds lost just twice at Anfield in 2013 — against West Brom and Southampton — so beginning 2014 on home turf, they were expected to get the year off to a winning start.

Hull had set up to contain the Reds, something Rodgers expects many teams to do now at Anfield as they have restored a fear factor to this fabled old ground that was missing in recent years.

But the Tigers did have the first opening with Yannick Sagbo proving wasteful from distance. His error would prove more costly considering the fact that Hull would rarely threaten again, if at all.

Suarez thought he had the opener in the 19th minute but his headed effort from Philippe Coutinho’s free-kick was rightly called offside by the assistant referee.

While the Uruguay forward was denied by the officials, Raheem Sterling lost out to his own lack of composure when played in by Suarez’s deft header only to divert the ball straight at Hull goalkeeper Allan McGregor, a grateful recipient.

Agger would eventually break the deadlock of a rather laboured New Year’s Day encounter with a header from Coutinho’s corner.

Chances would fall to Jordan Henderson and Coutinho before the break to put the game to bed but as has happened so many times this season, Suarez’s brilliance secured the three points.

Just five minutes into the second half, he was fouled 25 yards from goal and took the resulting free-kick himself to find the top corner for his 20th goal of what is turning out to be quite a remarkable season.

Hull boss Steve Bruce brought Matty Fryatt, Danny Graham and George Boyd off the bench but it would have little effect with no real chances presenting themselves to any of the three forwards.

Coutinho almost scored a wonder goal to cap off a fine performance from the Brazil midfielder but his meandering run that took him through Hull’s half ended with a timid shot that was comfortably saved.

Hull have won just once since their early December win over Liverpool, a 6-0 hammering of Fulham on Saturday, and Bruce feels his squad is struggling to cope with the fixture load.

“We were game enough to keep on trying but there were a lot of tired bodies out there and three games in six days was a bit much for us,” he said.

“For a club like us to get a result at a place like this you have to be right at it. When we played them three or four weeks ago we had had a week’s preparation and in this game we couldn’t play with the same intensity.”

LIVERPOOL (4-2-3-1): Mignolet 6; Johnson 6 (Toure 55, 6), Agger 7, Skrtel 6, Cissokho 6; Lucas 6, Henderson 6; Aspas 6 (Gerrard 62), Coutinho 8, Sterling 6 (Moses 77, 6); Suarez 8.

HULL (4-4-2): McGregor 6; Bruce 5, Chester 6, Davies 6, Figueroa 5; Elmohamady 6, Huddlestone 6, Livermore 6, Koren 6 (Graham 58, 6), Meyler 5 (Boyd 58, 6); Sagbo 5 (Fryatt 58, 6).

Referee: Craig Pawson.