You could hear the double chest-beat from a penalty kick’s distance.
Jurgen Klopp drummed it out with even more demonic, celebratory zeal than usual.
He realised James Milner’s far-from-boring, clipped clincher from the spot carried more than mathematical significance.
He knew this was the type of victory that runs through any title challenge like writing through rock.
The type of victory that Klopp has often found elusive in his short English time.
Watchers wondering whether this Liverpool edition is a package that can compete for ribbon rights wore one, uniform knowing look at half-time.
They were anticipating a Klopp speciality.
For all the thrills of almost a year of Jurgen, there have been Premier League losses to Crystal Palace, Newcastle, Watford, West Ham, Manchester United, Leicester City, Southampton, Swansea and Burnley.
One or two powerhouses in there but hardly a roll call of fear.
And after an abject first half performance, the familiarity of a momentum-halting, insipid defeat beckoned.
The second half was a credential test. Klopp knew it.
That is why he was - as Milner pointed out - ‘very angry’. If Milner says someone is ‘very’ something, they are ‘very’ something.
Liverpool passed the credential test.
Not with gloriously flying colours - Milner’s winner and Roberto Firmino’s equaliser were pretty much the consequence of defensive aberrations.
Not with thumping certainty - Mike van der Hoorn’s added time miss for Swansea was a van der Horror.
Not with eye-burning brilliance - Klopp called the second half better but not ‘great’. But they passed it.
As much as anyone, Milner drove them forward, while Nathaniel Clyne and Sadio Mane gave a thrusting purpose on the opposite flank.
Firmino perked up - he couldn’t have got less perkier - and Georginio Wijnaldum showed up.
Simply, though, there was an intensity about Liverpool’s second half revival that suggested they understood the added dash of symbolism.
While psychologically, the comeback will be a fillip for Klopp, he knows there is plenty to consider during the long, international break.
(It’s Manchester United at Anfield next up in two weeks’ time.)
Although there have been green shoots of defensive resilience this season, it is still likely to be Liverpool’s dubious resistance threshold that holes any potential title challenge.
This was Klopp’s 37th Premier League game and his team has conceded 50 goals in those games.
On only three occasions has a team won the Premier League conceding more than one goal per game.
There was an element here of Loris Karius - whose distribution was not great - still trying to develop a relationship with Dejan Lovren and Joel Matip but the defensive sluggishness set Liverpool’s first half tempo.
Had Borja - as he likes to be mono-named - not had a head like a fifty pence piece, Swansea might have been beyond recall at half-time.
To be fair, though, it was his nod-down that stirred familiar set-piece chaos in Liverpool ranks, donating a tap-in to Leroy Fer.
That vulnerability could have been costly in the closing stages but Liverpool just about merited a fourth Premier League __win on the spin.
It won’t send their supporters dizzy with title delirium. It won’t make their rivals sit up any straighter and take greater notice.
But this WAS a check on the realism of Liverpool’s title aspirations.
And it turns out they are real.