Jurgen Klopp is learning from mistakes at Liverpool

This time last year Liverpool were in cruising in the Premier League, but a congested December was to take its toll on the high flying Reds.

Comparisons can be drawn between Liverpool's 2016/17 season and the ongoing campaign: An embarrassing away result sparked a massive turnaround and the Reds went unbeaten in all competitions from the 20th August right up until Sunday 4th December. Sound familiar? But, this was to foreshadow an upcoming downfall to their so far amazing season.

The two results mentioned were in fact against two of the Premier League's minnows: Burnley and Bournemouth, fans couldn't get their heads around it- how could this team that were beating the likes of Arsenal, Tottenham, and Chelsea with ease, not get past Burnley and Bournemouth?

A year is a long time in football and evidently has arguably seen a lot of reflection at Liverpool Football Club; last season the starting 11 was no surprise, the fans knew how Liverpool were going to line-up and if the fans knew then the opposition knew. An element of predictability came into play and as soon as January arrived teams knew how to stop them and this was evident with their inability to string together consecutive wins until April.

All the form that had been built up at the start of the season and that scintillating unbeaten run had been undone by a couple of months of inconsistency. To say predictability is the only reason their season went south would be naive, although no plan B was a key factor because as soon as teams had figured the Reds out their games appeared to follow a similar pattern each week often stemming into disappointing results.

However, it also must be taken into consideration the fatigue this group of players must have suffered, a lack of rotation and an intense game plan is bound to take its toll on players and will have also been a huge contributing factor to the tailing off of their title chase and it is surely not just a coincidence that after the busiest period of the season, in which Liverpool barely changed there side, that they struggled most.

Despite Liverpool being sussed at this period, their own performances lacked the intensity that had been ever so deadly in the earlier stages of the season which resulted in the 5-1 and 6-1 thumpings of both Hull and Watford.

On the contrary, it appears this season that the element of predictability and fatiguing is now well and truly absent from Liverpool as Jurgen Klopp- often labelled too stubborn- has changed his ways.

Many were incredibly unapproving of Liverpool's summer business for many different reasons, but the additions appear to have bolstered their squad and increased the number of quality options Klopp has at his disposal. But just like their previous season, Liverpool approach the Christmas season with a lengthy unbeaten run in what has been an incredibly busy season so far for the Reds in which they have already played 24 games and by the end of December this will have increased to 30 (7 games more than last season).

Rotation has been key to Liverpool's season with there quite occasionally being 5 changes made from the team that played in the last game and Klopp yet to name an unchanged side, which last season was unheard of and this continuous alternating has kept Liverpool both unpredictable and fresh- in a schedule that is only going to get busier over Christmas that is exactly what they need. A heavier workload for the Reds has earned a response from Jurgen Klopp, and so far he has evidently got it right and in the process righted his wrongs of the past.

Whether or not Liverpool can beat the January blues again this year is yet to be seen but the change of Klopp's methods both selection wise and tactically would suggest that we will definitely not see a replica of last season. To be unbeaten since October is more than good going for any team and the way Liverpool are playing at the moment- no matter who's on the pitch- indicates that an exciting second half of the season is ahead for Kopites!