How Mignolet is 'always ready' when called upon
Simon Mignolet's hard work away from the pitch ensured he was fully prepared to step back into the Liverpool goal on Wednesday night.
The Belgium international returned to Jürgen Klopp's Premier League line-up for the meeting with Middlesbrough at the Riverside Stadium.
A clean sheet helped the Reds on their way to a morale-boosting 3-0 win in the north east – a timely result following the defeat at Bournemouth and draw with West Ham United.
“I always try to be ready in this kind of period,” said Mignolet.
“I am somebody who thinks about training for yourself and you have to make sure you keep fit and healthy and ready.
“In football, things can change very quickly with an injury or an illness. Therefore you have to look after yourself, stay professional, keep your head down, work hard and off the pitch stay focused, which is not always easy, especially as a 'keeper.
“As a striker you can come on to help the team at certain moments but here you have to wait for your chance to come and try to be ready.
“I only knew I was playing on Tuesday and then I had to focus on my own job to make sure I was ready to play. You have to be mentally strong as a 'keeper.”
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Mignolet replaced summer signing Loris Karius between the posts and, in speaking to the media after the game, backed his fellow stopper to emerge stronger from a testing time.
He explained: “The goalkeeper position is not an easy one. You can only speak about it if you are a goalkeeper yourself.
“We are teammates, so of course I have sympathy. I am 28 now and I have been through it as well. At a club like Liverpool, one mistake gets really big out of nothing. I know what it is like and it's not nice.
“The most important thing is Liverpool Football Club. No individual is more important than the club.
“Obviously for Loris it won't be nice but he is more than capable and professional enough to deal with that and learn from it. He will get stronger.”
The No.22 also highlighted the unity among the goalkeeping contingent as they prepared for their very own festive celebration on Thursday night.
“We have got our goalies union Christmas dinner, so we will go out for food,” Mignolet revealed. “All the goalies at Melwood will go out.
“Adam Bogdan, with his injury, will probably miss it but there will probably be around 10 of us. All the young boys will come along as well. The goalies union is something special. We only know our situation and what it is like.”