'I saw him': Pundit noticed Curtis Jones having a go at £44m Liverpool player on Sunday
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Curtis Jones put in an incredible display for Liverpool against Chelsea at the weekend.
The midfielder was arguably Man of the Match on the day as he scored the winning goal and won the penalty to put Liverpool 1-0 up.
Jones received plenty of praise for his performance during the game, but it wasn't just in his individual showing where he stepped up.
Indeed, Jones also stepped up as a leader in this match, and according to Jason McAteer, speaking on the Official Liverpool podcast, the midfielder was actually having a go at Cody Gakpo in the first-half of the match.
Curtis Jones spotted having a go at Cody Gakpo
McAteer noted that he saw Jones have a go at Gakpo.
The pundit believes Jones was telling the £44m man to play more positively, claiming that the Dutchman wasn't looking confident in terms of making forward runs and offering options to Jones on the ball.
"He's one of those Curtis for me, he's a confidence player who works himself into the game. I saw him having a go at Gakpo in the first-half. I said it to Tommo, I said 'he keeps going backwards.' And the reason was that Gakpo, I didn't think he felt vs Reece James he had the run of him, so he wasn't offering himself, and that made Curtis go backwards and I think he was finding that frustrating," McAteer said.
Jones was mentored by Jordan Henderson
It's not surprising to hear that Jones is becoming more and more vocal on the pitch. After all, he was mentored by one of football's great leaders, Jordan Henderson.
Indeed, Jones has previously spoken about how Henderson and James Milner always helped him at Liverpool.
"Wow yeah, as you said, they're two lads who came into the game young and are still in it now.
"I've been around them now since I was 17 and everything they do is just spot on.
"The food, how hard they train and they give everything for their teammates.
"All the stuff that I've learnt since being around them, so they're definitely two lads that have helped me a lot."
Jones is really stepping up into that leadership role at Liverpool, and if he continues to be this vocal and take games by the scruff of the neck, he will soon become undroppable in this Liverpool team.
Who knows? Perhaps Jones could be a Liverpool captain in a few years' time once Virgil van Dijk leaves the club amid rumours that Trent Alexander-Arnold could go to Real Madrid.
