Blues boss Gary O’Neil was proud of his side and the way they responded to going two goals down early on, despite falling to a 2-0 defeat to Liverpool at Portman Road.

Alexander Isak netted in the sixth and ninth minutes to give the Merseysiders what proved to be an unassailable lead, but O’Neil was pleased with the reaction to that tough situation.

“I thought we were excellent, really proud of the group,” he said. “Two mistakes in the first nine minutes which made it very difficult, but to respond the way they did, to probably be the better side, probably edge it from that moment on - more shots.

“An unbelievable response, so very pleased. Disappointed because obviously we’re here for points and we don’t take any, but pleased that the progress that we’ve made and that we were able to go toe-to-toe with such a talented side for so long.

“But, as we know, the level is ruthless. If you step out of the line a little bit, a world-class player ducks behind you and scores. The first goal really avoidable as well.

“So disappointed, but from there, Manchester United away, we struggled to respond to adversity. Today, for that to be tested inside nine minutes and for them to come together and produce a performance like that took some doing.

“So, pleased with them. Group’s in a good spot. We’re just really excited to get going again next week. Looking forward to it.”

Looking at the goals, O’Neil was asked how frustrated he was by them and whether keeper Kjell Scherpen, who has conceded eight goals in his first three Premier League matches, is under the spotlight for his part in them.

“I don’t know about spotlight, I mean the way it goes in, the first one, you don’t expect that to go in, I guess. But he’s made some good saves for us as well and he was decent for us in build-up today.

“People will make mistakes. I’m really clear on that with the group, that mistakes are no problem. That’s going to happen, but it’s how we behave as a group and how we perform and how we commit to things.

“I can’t control everything, the game was exactly as we prepped. It looked exactly like the last two days in training. We had some unbelievable spells. Even on top of the fact that we had more shots, we arrived in the penalty area with Leif [Davis] and things we’d worked on so many times, but we will have to find a way to not let mistakes be the deciding factor, of course.

“But, let’s be clear that if you make mistakes against [Alexander] Isak and [Florian] Wirtz and [Bradley] Barcola and [Cody] Gakpo, there’s a fair chance they get punished. And we did, we did get punished.

“But, like I say, I asked the group to perform in a certain way. I asked them to commit to something and to see 30,000 fans still stood there at the end on their feet applauding the players for what they’ve just given tells you enough I think about where they feel the group is at and what they gave today.

“So, no problem for me. We take no points, but the performance and where we are as a group feels like a small win, to be honest. The response to going 2-0 down feels like a win.

“And excited that the group shows quality, shows resilience, shows togetherness and we’ll just get ready to go again next week and fully commit to what we’re going to do and, hopefully, next week it goes in our favour and we can put three points on the board.”

Argentinian World Cup winner Exequiel Palacios was handed his full debut on his first appearance at Portman Road and O’Neil was pleased with the former Bayer Leverkusen midfielder’s display.

“Excellent,” he said. “We were much better with the ball tonight, you don’t see teams cut through an Andoni Iraola side like that very often, even top sides.

“We were able to get through the middle a lot. Sasa [Lukic] and him, good combinations, good understanding. Pleased, I thought he was good. I obviously took him off just to protect him a little bit, he’s not played too much.

“Subs, again had a decent impact when they came on. We needed a moment, didn’t we? From a corner, I think it gets caught between Alisson’s legs or something. We just needed a moment to give everyone a [lift], like, OK, we’re back, it’s 2-1, we’ve got a chance.

“But we kept huffing, kept puffing all the way until the end. So, pleased. I thought it was a good performance.

“But I hate having to talk about good performances when you don’t get points because you need to maximise them. To play well and to be in a game like that in the Premier League, it feels like you’ve just wasted one a little bit because we could have taken something from that.

“But it is what it is. There’ll be plenty of them, it’s a ruthless level. We get ready to go again, two more games before the international break, recover the group and make sure we’re ready.

Quizzed on whether he believes Liverpool ought to have been reduced to 10 men when Jeremy Jacquet looked to have fouled Emersonn only a couple of minutes after being booked for another challenge on the Brazilian, O’Neil felt the decision might have gone his team’s way.

“I don’t know. I thought there was a possible yellow card,” he reflected. “It wasn’t given as a foul, was it? But there was a moment there that it could have gone another way, but no complaints from me.

“Just maybe timekeeping. We’ve been pushed on time-wasting a lot and my goalie’s been hurried up at Old Trafford to kick the ball when we’re not even set and I felt like they were able to kill the game much easier here. So that just upset me a bit, I felt like they could have been hurried up a little bit more.

“But I thought the officials did a good job. VAR arrived on a good conclusion for the penalty claim [when Dominik Szoboszlai was fouled by Davis but having strayed offside in the build-up].

“And now the focus goes really onto tidying up the mistakes because they can kill you in Premier League seasons, but let’s focus on a load of the positives. That’s a world-class team we’ve just faced with an abundance of talent.

“And I don’t think you could tell too much between the two teams for long, long periods. I’d have loved it to have been worth points for us. It isn’t, but what it does give us is more belief. More belief in the stadium. You can feel it. More belief inside the dressing room.

“They get a little bit of a break now. They’ll have a down day tomorrow and then we’ll get ourselves back in and I’m really looking forward to taking a group to Crystal Palace to see what we can do.”

Photo: TWTD