Liverpool's two-points-per-game record in the Premier League is satisfactory for Jürgen Klopp, but the manager sees plenty more room for improvement.

His side reclaimed third place in the table, and closed the gap to Manchester United in second to two points, with a 2-0 win at Southampton on Sunday.

Roberto Firmino and Mohamed Salah took turns apiece to set up the other to score at St Mary’s – “good players, eh?” said Klopp with a smile – and increase the Reds’ tally to 54 points from 27 games.

And while the boss was underwhelmed by certain passages of play on the south coast, he considers the situation a positive rather than a negative.

“I said at half-time that either it was really quick in the counter-attack or we completely stopped,” Klopp told Liverpoolfc.com after the final whistle.

“We have this little ‘flu’ – we need to keep and pass the ball more. We can still improve in these situations because we take risks in situations where it’s like, ‘wow, why did we play that pass?’

“So, space for improvement. We have 54 points and space for improvement, so it’s good and I’m happy about that.”

Firmino’s opening goal was the Brazilian’s 20th of the season, while Salah is now one away from 30 this term after capitalising on a stunning back-heel assist from his fellow forward to net the second of the match.

Liverpool were indebted to Loris Karius, though, for two excellent saves with the score at 1-0 – and Klopp was eager to spread praise across the whole team.

“We are happy and we know about their value and quality. But it was a good performance of a lot of players,” he said.

“Loris Karius played a fantastic game – good saves and was really football smart. One time, it was brilliant and he created a goal; the next one, maybe our player was still a little bit surprised, we have to get used to that a bit more.

“Emre was strong. Gini was really strong – especially in the second half. The full-backs were much better in the second half. Both centre-halves were absolutely spot-on.

“Sadio had a strong performance – close in this or that situation but good on the ball, safe with the ball, good passes and the speed was there. So, a lot of good performances. I loved the game.”

The victory was achieved despite a late, enforced change to the Reds’ travel plans.

“We had training [on Saturday] and were sitting at Melwood, and there were some problems with the plane,” Klopp explained.

“I said, ‘stay cool, we will find a solution, we’ll come to Southampton if we take the bike!’ In the end, we went home and met [on Sunday] morning. The boys did well. It was different but still good enough.”