Dejan Lovren: 'Liverpool are title contenders'

Liverpool defender Dejan Lovren has claimed that his side are genuine title contenders this season.

The Reds currently sit second in the Premier League table following a late 1-0 win over Everton in Monday night's Merseyside derby, although six points still separate them from leaders Chelsea.

Liverpool's defensive record was criticised earlier in the season but, having now kept back-to-back clean sheets in the league for the first time since March, Lovren believes that their improvement at the back could provide the foundations for a title charge.

"There are a lot of games in front of us and it will change many times, but games like this you need to win if you want to stay in the race for the title," Lovren told reporters.

"We are in second so we can say yes [we are title contenders]. It is about the team's defensive qualities. We have been working very hard together and just now we are in good form and we need to keep going like that.

"We missed something in the first half, but we had a good quality talk from the manager at half time and he was asking us to play more direct football. If you want to win you need to be more offensive and ask for the ball. In the second half we showed our real face and deserved it."

Liverpool currently have one more point than they did at the same stage of the 2013-14 season, when they topped the league at Christmas.