Monday, September 30, 2013

Rodgers Lauds Suarez-Sturridge

Liverpool boss Brendan Rodgers has said he is delighted to have Luis Suarez back in the fold, hailing his combination with Daniel Sturridge.

Suarez, back in Premier League action after his ten-game suspension for biting Chelsea's Branislav Ivanovic, worked well with Sturridge to clinch a 3-1 win at Sunderland on Sunday.

Sturridge opened the scoring before assisting both of Suarez's goals as the Reds returned to winning ways after recent losses against Southampton and Manchester United.

Rodgers said: "I am not sure there are two better in the league, in all honesty. There are some wonderful partnerships around. You have got [Robin] Van Persie and [Wayne] Rooney up there, who are outstanding, but these two are right up there and they showed that against Sunderland.

"We have changed the structure of our team a wee bit to allow us to pass it better -- we have still got an awful of work to do -- and also to fit in with the types of players we have.

"They will only get better. You can see their understanding. We have done a lot of work with them together in training and they looked very, very bright today.

"They are two different types as well, which makes it hard for defenders because one has pace, one has power and two good feet, and the other is a wriggler and can shift his body very quickly and ends up in the box.

"He's getting the reward for his hard work over the period that he was off. I thought he was excellent the other night at Old Trafford.

"Him and Daniel up front are a real, real handful. They combined very well. On the back of a really tough game where we played well during the week, today was always going to be physically demanding game for us.

"I thought the work we put into it was exceptional and to get the three goals and maybe a few more chances to score a few more. I thought we were really dangerous on the counter-attack and as a team we worked really, really hard."

Sunderland interim head coach Kevin Ball was pleased with his side's efforts in his second game in charge. "We spoke at half-time and I thought you saw a great reaction," he said. "They gave it a really good go in the second half.

"We took it right to the death but unfortunately you're susceptible to that counter-attack where 3-1 - and I don't mean this as disrespect to Liverpool - flatters them a little bit. It was a shame because I thought the lads had a real good go today and that's something we need to take heart from."

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