Lucas ready to make Chelsea pay for City injustice

Lucas Leiva insists Liverpool head to Chelsea motivated by a sense of injustice following the 2-1 defeat at Manchester City on Boxing Day.

Brendan Rodgers’ men produced a spirited performance on Thursday against the only team with a 100 per cent home record in the Premier League this season and led through Philippe Coutinho’s 24th-minute goal before City hit back through Vincent Kompany and Alvaro Negredo.

Raheem Sterling had a legitimate goal disallowed for offside and Luis Suarez had penalty claims waved away as Liverpool left the Etihad Stadium feeling hard done by.

Next up is a trip to Stamford Bridge on Sunday and Lucas is determined to bounce back against another side in the most open title race in years

“Of course everyone was really disappointed that we never got the three points, or at least a point,” Lucas told the club’s official website.

“Everyone could see that we really went to win the game. I think we played some fantastic football.

“Maybe we felt a little bit unlucky with some of the decisions. If they were for us, not against us, it would have been a different result. We had some chances to score.

“Overall, it was a positive performance but of course we are disappointed because we lost.

“Now we have to move on – we have another big game and it becomes even more important after the defeat the other night.

“We showed against Tottenham (a 5-0 win at White Hart Lane earlier this month) as well, a big team, that we went there and played our football and passed the ball really well and we pressed.

“That’s our main quality, when we press the team and try to play. We become a very hard team to beat.

“That’s the way we have to play every game; Sunday will be another opportunity for us to show that we have great momentum despite the defeat we had against Manchester City.”