It's amazing what a win over your local rivals can do.
A week after Jurgen Klopp had admitted that he had to give his Liverpool players two days off because, frankly, he was sick of looking at them and they were sick of looking at each other, it was all smiles at the AXA Training Centre in Kirkby on Thursday in the aftermath of Monday night's win over Everton.
One result does not make a season of course, especially one as below par as this one has been for a side who came into the campaign seeking to recapture the highs of 2021-22, but the Merseyside derby was a definitive step in the right direction for Liverpool.
"It felt like us, it looked like us," was Jurgen Klopp's take on it at full-time.
"It was a really important night. It gave us all the signs that was us tonight, and now we have to make sure it is us from now on."
Strap yourselves in then, because it seems that a corner has been turned.
Such words have been spoken before during this campaign of course, and any elevation from them has always been met with a swift fall on the face, but admittedly there was a different feel to Monday, and a suggestion that things might end up changing for the better.
One of the main reasons for that was the options available to Klopp, who was able to introduce Diogo Jota and Roberto Firmino from a bench which Virgil van Dijk didn't even get off, except to intervene in the fracas which has landed Liverpool and Everton with an FA charge.
That won't have dampened the mood at Kirkby though, where Klopp will hope that his side are ready to bite down on the gum shield and prepare to embrace what is still just under half a season left to play.
Suddenly there is a freshness to the side with those injury returns, the ongoing acclimatisation of Cody Gakpo and the inherent promise of the exciting Stefan Bajcetic, who was voted as the supporters' player of the month for January on Thursday. "It's crazy," he exclaimed, "if you will tell me two months ago I wouldn't believe it. It's happened - so, I guess I have to believe it!"
There was also a sight for sore eyes on Thursday as Luis Diaz was spotted out on the Kirkby grass doing running sessions, his first such programme since the recurrence of his knee injury at Liverpool's winter training camp in Dubai.
It will be a little longer before he's seen in action, with the player himself said to be targeting the Champions League last-16 second leg at Real Madrid, and before that comes a pivotal month of matches which will determine just where Liverpool's season is headed.
First comes the trip to a suddenly stalling Newcastle on Saturday, with a win there catapulting Klopp's side right back into the top four picture and the race for the Champions League.
It is the real McCoy next Tuesday when Real Madrid come to town for the first leg of that last-16 tie, before a trip to Crystal Palace and a home game with Wolves which will offer the chance to put right the lamentable display at Molineux earlier this month.
Then Manchester United come to town for another massive top four clash, before a trip to Bournemouth and that away in game in Madrid that Diaz is targeting.
So, seven games in just over a month. Three Premier League fixtures Liverpool simply have to win to have any chance of getting where they want to go, and two they probably can't afford to lose.
And then two against the side they lost out to in Madrid nine months ago in the final game of a season which seemed to completely exhaust them.
It is this period which will determine if they've finally recovered.
