Curtis Jones' new-look role under at has led to accusations that misused the midfielder, who the former boss previously indicated had saved the club millions of pounds.

on Sunday (October 20), having won the penalty for Mohamed Salah's opener. He then cooly poked home the winner past Robert Sanchez just three minutes after Nicolas Jackson had levelled the scoring in the second half.

Jones' impressive performance, which could have seen him earn another first-half penalty were it not for VAR overturning the on-field decision, earned him the man of the match award as leapfrogged to reclaim their place atop the table.

After struggling with injury earlier in the season, the midfielder has established himself in Slot's midfield in a slightly different role to the one he played under Klopp.

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Jones is afforded more creativity in his new role, and according to Micah Richards – discussing the Englishman's stellar showing against on podcast – Jones' former team-mate Daniel Sturridge believes Klopp didn't get the best out of him due to not playing to Jones' strengths.

Richards said: "I was asking Daniel [Sturridge] how good he is or can be, and he said that he's always had that technical ability and confidence, he sort of said he thought Klopp used him more just as a worker and a runner to press, so you didn't really get to see the quality he has on the ball. But today he showed exactly the player he is, I thought he was outstanding."

Having been handed his professional debut in 2019 by the legendary German, the new Head of Soccer at Red Bull admitted that the progression Jones and Harvey Elliott showed last season saved the club from splashing out millions in the transfer market.

"How the boys developed, how Curtis developed, how Harvey developed, so many things through that difficult period," Klopp said in March earlier this year. "As difficult as it was, something positive always happened. The very young ones coming in and how they performed, or how the boys who were already with us improved.

"The step Curtis made is insane and the step Harvey made as well, proper, proper. If you have to buy these boys, you spend real money. And we have them, which is really cool."

Jones isn't the only Reds midfielder who Slot has been able to get more out of this term. Ryan Gravenberch has shown his quality in the middle of the park after a tricky first season following his arrival from last year, and it has helped to mask the pain of missing out on top summer transfer target Martin Zubimendi, who chose to stay with Real Sociedad despite Liverpool meeting his release clause.

Ahead of a clash against RB Leipzig on Wednesday, another mouth-watering domestic battle awaits Liverpool on Sunday. They are set to travel to the Emirates to take on title rivals , who will be without William Saliba after the centre-half was shown a red card in the Gunners' 2-0 defeat to .

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