With eight teenagers in the team against Strasbourg on Sunday night, Jurgen Klopp provided a glimpse into what could await on the pitch in years to come at Anfield.
But looming large over the iconic stadium itself was a pointer to a more immediate future; one that is the latest step in Fenway Sports Group's grand plan for Liverpool FC.
The 300-tonne roof truss that was lifted over the Anfield Road stand last month was unmistakable for anyone at the final pre-season game over the weekend. It's the latest tangible sign of the progress that is being made off the pitch under FSG's guidance.
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The £80m development project remains on course for a grand unveiling in 12 months' time as Anfield gets set for its biggest attendance of the Premier League era when doors open on a new 61000-seat stadium.
Completion of the work will take FSG's overall spending on club infrastructure to around the £240m mark having already overseen the Main Stand increase to the tune of £110m in 2016 and the build of the AXA Training Centre in Kirkby at a cost of £50m.
Elsewhere, the club have made great strides with their latest shirt agreement with Standard Chartered. The banking firm have been the Reds' main sponsors since 2010 and the new long-term agreement will be worth around £50m per year to the Reds, making it the biggest ever of its kind at Anfield.
FSG insiders speak of a "virtuous circle" at the club whereby success on the pitch helps boost the visibility and revenue off it. That, in turn, helps bring more silverware to the trophy room as a result. It's the ethos that underpins everything they do under CEO Billy Hogan and Fenway president Mike Gordon, who is by far the most visible and hands-on member of the ownership group.
For example, Liverpool's on-field fortunes last season - when they came closer than any other team before them to sweeping the board and winning the quadruple, while also lifting both domestic cups - inevitably led to increased interest from companies across the world.
Hogan's team spoke with firms from the tourism and travel industry, media, electronics and emerging markets such as blockchain and cryptocurrency, before it was decided that the current arrangement with Standard Chartered was still the best fit, with an improved bottom line reflective of their progress since 2018.
The subsequent figures earned from those deals are then reinvested back into the club itself in an effort to sustain the success that has steadily flown towards Klopp's side since 2019. The virtuous circle in full effect.
Liverpool's owners, while never taking money out of the club, have always insisted the club pays for itself. It can, at times, appear to be a divisive strategy, mainly when it comes to potential incomings in the transfer market, but the self-sustainable model keeps the Reds from a situation like Chelsea's earlier this year, when Russian owner Roman Abramovich was sanctioned by the UK Government before he was forced to sell to American Todd Boehly.
FSG's way of working means such dramatic and drastic measures won't ever have to be contemplated at Anfield, but that is not to say the Americans have always enjoyed universally high approval ratings.
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Mistakes have been made in recent years. The decision to use the Government's furlough scheme at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic was roundly criticised prior to the U-turn days later, while the owners' call to enter into the European Super League in April 2021 was an embarrassing and mercifully short-lived episode that left principal owner John W Henry apologising to the supporters from across the other side of the Atlantic.
It was a relatively short period of time that angered plenty behind the scenes at the club with the owners being squarely blamed for their lack of communication down the chain prior to the controversial announcement at the time. Close to 18 months on, the two-day timeline has long been consigned to history at Anfield.
FSG eventually saw the error of their ways and perhaps their biggest real failing during their tenure has been the inability to canvass the opinion of supporters or enter into any sort of public consultation over major decisions like the Super League participation or the plan to raise ticket prices to £77 in 2016 - another move that led to an about-turn.
The agreement with supporters' union, the Spirit of Shankly, following the collapse of the Super League has at least helped on that front but it must be stressed that those errors have at times been disingenuously used by fans whose gripes mainly centre around a lack of transfers. That, perhaps, remains the biggest problem for many, despite the world-class squad that has been assembled on Klopp and former sporting director Michael Edwards' watch.
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