Joe Gomez believes that "a fire" has been lit under Liverpool this season and says their strong campaign has been underpinned by the depth of the squad
Gomez has been playing at left-back in recent weeks due to the injuries to both Andy Robertson and Kostas Tsimikas
Liverpool have also been without Thiago Alcantara all season and have been made to deal with prolonged absences for the likes of Joel Matip, Alexis Mac Allister, Diogo Jota and Stefan Bajcetic at various points.
Liverpool also beat Arsenal without the hamstrung Dominik Szoboszlai, Mohamed Salah and Wataru Endo
Gomez says the squad's ability to discard the list of absentees held them in good stead as they beat the Gunners
Gomez
"There’s definitely a good bond in the team,"
"There’s definitely a freshness and just a fire about the team. We’re not really over-analysing who we've lost [to injury] and who we don’t have. We’ve got top players who we’ve missed this year - Thiago, Robbo, Kostas, Mo going (to Africa Cup of Nations with Egypt).
"But I think the gaffer keeps reiterating that we can all do a job defensively and we can all defend, It means we don’t have to worry about who’s missing.
"We just have to keep digging deep and we have to keep that mentality. It's still early and there’s a long way to go but we can only take one at a time.
"We’ve got a bit more of a spring in our step. It’s a quick turnaround now again. Because we won, thankfully, it gets us a bit of a break in between fixtures (as no replay).
"That will do us some good and obviously we want to try and get to another final. It’s another big game on Wednesday (against Fulham in the Carabao Cup semi-final first leg), we want to get to another final, over two legs but we’ll go for it. We'll see how we get on.
"We were under quite a bit of pressure in the first half and they had some big chances.
"But I think sort of we rode the storm, got a bit more of a foothold in the game in the second half.
"Sometimes a good delivery and own goal can go in our favour then we can catch them on the counter for the second goal. It’s a really tough place to come, top opposition and we know we’ve done well to come away with a win."
Gomez added:
"We don’t want to get giddy. All I can at the moment is we’re all just full of desire and want to make the best out of the season. All we can do is take it one game at a time, I know it’s a cliche, but there’s desire and we have a platform to build on.
"We just have to keep at it. We can’t take that for granted, as we know with last season, it’s not always plain-sailing and we went through rough patches but we built from it and learnt from it.
"We are learning from it and we've obviously had a few late comebacks in games. So we have to keep at it. See where it takes us.
"It’s different playing at left back. It’s been a challenge to adapt. There are some small, minor differences that maybe aren’t noticed, maybe how you receive the ball and so on. But I’m just, people at the club know me now, they know I will give my all.
"I’ve been here long enough now but I’m grateful to play for the club. I just attack each game, it's just about trying to dig in as a team and try to do what we can do as a collective.
We have some injuries but it is what it is and we will just keep persevering. That's all we can do as a collective and that's how I feel personally too.
"It's tough playing against Bukayo Saka, he's obviously a top player and a direct winger. It’s not often the case these days in the Premier League but he’s one that will stay wide to pick up the ball and drive at you. It was tough and I knew it was going to be having played against him so recently.
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