Brendan Rodgers hails 'magnificent' Liverpool

Liverpool manager Brendan Rodgers sang his side's praises following their 3-0 victory over Sunderland.

The Reds boss said that he was delighted with the amount of effort his players put in, describing them as "magnificent".

"You've got to give massive credit to the players," he told Sky Sports News. "The effort they put into the game tonight, as well as the quality, was phenomenal.

"They were magnificent. You look throughout the country and there are a lot of tired players and performers having had to play four games in such a short period.

"But you look at the intensity and conditioning of our players tonight and the work they put into the game, married with the quality, was fantastic."

Luis Suarez found the net twice and Raheem Sterling got his name on the scoresheet during a one-sided encounter at Anfield.

"Sometimes you only get credit when you win. For us, we've drawn a lot of games and haven't quite got the credit because we haven't won the game," Rodgers added.

"But these players over the course of the season have done very, very well and haven't got the points total we deserve. But I believe in the second half of the season we'll be able to up the tempo and we can kick on.

"You see the nature of our game now - our pressing, the intensity, our pressure, the superiority we're gaining in midfield in order to control games and creating many chances - we had 29 shots against Sunderland. It's about consistency and hopefully we can get that over the coming months and years."

The result leaves Liverpool in eighth place in the Premier League with 31 points from 21 games played.