The moment the Brentford supporters opened their mouths, you knew what was going to happen. You just knew it.

Darwin Nunez was still trotting on to the pitch having been introduced midway through the second half when he was serenaded by chants from the home crowd that suggested the Uruguayan was, in polite terms, an inferior version of former Liverpool striker Andy Carroll.

Nunez, of course, has heard it all before. And as Bournemouth and fans of several other clubs have previously discovered, it’s probably not a good idea to goad the forward in such a manner.

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Brentford’s followers, though, clearly hadn’t been paying attention, all the more baffling given Nunez had opened the scoring audacious fashion when the Reds romped to victory at the Gtech Community Stadium last season.

This time Nunez had to wait until the first minute of injury-time to do likewise when sweeping home Trent Alexander-Arnold’s cross from close range, prompting a celebration that was a mixture of both relief and delight among the Liverpool players and supporters after Arne Slot's side appeared on the brink of another damaging and frustrating result in the title race.

If there was a sense of inevitability to Nunez writing such a script, there perhaps wasn’t about the Reds finally breaking Brentford’s stubborn resistance during a game in which they dominated and, up until the closing moments, looked to be running out of ideas to score.

However, they deserve credit for sheer persistence, with Liverpool boss Slot ultimately, as at Nottingham Forest in midweek, making the right call with his in-game changes.

That fact was underlined two minutes later when Nunez smashed in an emphatic finish from fellow substitute Harvey Elliott’s pass to copper-bottom the victory.

It says much about the recent fortunes of Nunez that, even with Diogo Jota – a scoring substitute at Forest – absent injured, he remained benched having now started just two of the last seven Premier League games. Nunez had beforehand scored just twice in the top flight this season.

Liverpool, though, will hope this can be a turning point, with Slot admitting he hasn’t yet been able to bring the best out of the player Amid all the talk of interest from Saudi Arabia this transfer window, Nunez clearly still has a role to play at Anfield this season.

And while he may remain infuriatingly enigmatic, one thing is certain: opposing fans are never, ever going to learn about provoking the Reds forward.