Wednesday 21 September 2016 11:46, UK
Derby County striker Darren Bent admits his side were outclassed by Liverpool in the EFL Cup and hailed the Premier League club's "arrogant swagger" at the iPro Stadium.
Jurgen Klopp's side eased through to the fourth round of the cup with a comfortable 3-0 victory on Tuesday and Bent was willing to admit that size of the gulf in class between the two teams.
"It's massive. If you talk about the top end of the Premier League and the top end of the Championship it's massive," he said.
"The technical ability, the power there - it's kind of the arrogance as well.
"If you play for a top-level side, they all seem to come on the pitch with a kind of arrogant swagger where they know they're not going to get beat."
Summer signing Ragnar Klavan set the visitors on their way to an easy win with an instinctive finish midway through the first half after Richard Keogh had failed to clear a corner.
Derby made it to half-time without conceding another but were undone within four minutes of the restart when Roberto Firmino and Philippe Coutinho combined well to double Liverpool's advantage.
Divock Origi rounded off the victory with a well-struck finish just minutes later and Bent admits Derby struggled to cope with Liverpool's high intensity on the night.
"What really impressed me last night what how hard they work," he said. "Even though they had the ball a lot of the time, every time we got the ball and tried to keep it they were after us.
"They tried to win it back within five to ten seconds - they made it really difficult for us to get anything going really.
"We played as well as we could and gave it a good go but in the end it just wasn't good enough.
"They kept possession so well, moved the ball, looked dangerous, effective and I'm sure they're going to have a good season this year."
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