Brendan Rodgers returned with a clear target of making progress in the Champions League. Bergamo provided key signals for the future as well as the firm steps in the right direction.
Rodgers had every right to be satisfied with his work. He’d had to listen to some utter garbage in the wake of Dortmund about his coaching, that it was one-dimensional and that he couldn’t adapt.
Rodgers had already proven it when taking a Leicester team to the Etihad and beating Manchester City 5-2 with a counter-punching performance.
Following the Borussia beating, he had to put up with that rate of flak and I said clearly in this column that it wasn’t deserved because he had every right to go into that game with confidence because of the way his side were playing at the time.