Partying Liverpool players sing Kolo Toure's song

Liverpool captain Steven Gerrard and team mates out on impromptu show for Kolo

It wasn’t the best of seasons for Liverpool, by any means, but it’s finally over and done with now and time to start planning for the next one. It’ll be a season without Steven Gerrard of course, as he heads for Los Angeles and the start of his MLS career, and he got the chance to say goodbye to his team mates by going with them on a short break to Dubai on Sunday. It looks like they’ve all been having a blast.

Some eyebrows were raised at the players heading for the airport together straight after a defeat to Stoke branded as “unacceptable” by Jamie Carragher and many others, particularly at the 5-0 half time scoreline. The trip was already planned before the Britannia collapse, however, and was seen as an opportunity for some bonding for a squad under fire.

Rumours of dressing room unrest are hardly surprising given the dire performances and embarrassing results from Liverpool over the last nine months and a few days relaxing by the beach with a couple of beers was one way of clearing the air and making sure everybody got concerns off their chests. As long as the golf clubs were kept out of sight it was hardly going to hurt and judging by a video that emerged today it’s been a real boost to morale.

Gerrard won’t be leading his Liverpool team mates into battle again but he did a fairly good job of leading them in a song and dance routine up the escalator, singing the Kolo Toure song and showing off some pretty decent moves.

Kolo had some good news himself this week with the announcement yesterday that he’d signed an extension to the contract that was due to expire this summer and he’ll be one of the last few old heads in next season’s squad.

It’s very rare that the players get the chance to spend time together without being ‘on duty’, even on club trips abroad for pre-season there’s a constant schedule to stick to for public appearances and training sessions, let alone matches, and they are never really able to stray too far away from club officials.

It’s always easy to come up with ideas in hindsight, and there is always someone waiting to complain, but what difference might a trip like this have made in the middle of one of the rough patches of 2014/15? Hopefully there aren’t any rough patches next term, but if there are, someone needs to get looking for some flights.

Liverpool squad singing and dancing in Dubia