Sunday, 16 November 2008
GETTY IMAGES
Steven Gerrard scored a late header from a brilliant Fernando Torres cross to give Liverpool a 2-0 win at Bolton
the ground where Rafael Benitez suffered his first defeat and first
culture shock as manager of Liverpool four years ago, his team
yesterday confirmed how much they have grown up since. This time they
weathered the storm that finally blew up on each side of half-time and
should have won by a larger margin while maintaining the pressure on
Chelsea at the head of the table.
Bolton,
strong as ever on set-pieces, nevertheless went away feeling hard done
by after having a goal controversially disallowed from a corner in the
last minute of the first half. Rob Styles' decision that Kevin Nolan
impeded Pepe Reina was understandable, although it was unfortunate in
that he was the referee who gave a shocking penalty against them at Old
Trafford in September.
Benitez claimed: "The six-yard box is
for the keeper. If you have three players in front of him, he cannot go
for the ball. It's obstruction. It's the rules." Fifa guidelines to
referees state: "It is an offence to restrict the movement of the
goalkeeper by unfairly impeding him, for example at the taking of a
corner kick."
Bolton's manager, Gary Megson, who had given much
thought to his planning at set-pieces, predictably disagreed. "There
was nothing wrong with it," he said. "If there's any infringement, it
would be a penalty for a shove on Nolan."
Benitez had not won
here before last season and must have wondered early in the second half
if his players would be punished, like Manchester United at Everton
recently, for not making more of their earlier dominance. Their
profligacy continued to the end, but fortunately Steven Gerrard atoned
for his one bad miss by heading in to double the lead gained by Dirk
Kuyt, who had earlier smacked a shot against the bar.
Fernando
Torres, still not match-fit, came on for the last half hour and set up
Gerrard's goal, though for a while it looked as if Bolton's
RicardoGardner would be the more influential substitute. Brought on for
the second half in place of Fabrice Muamba, who had been man-marking
Gerrard, he offered some attacking threat at last but was another
player guilty of some poor finishing.
With only three points
covering the bottom half of the table at the start of play, Bolton
cannot afford to become too excited about reaching 11th place and will
struggle if their strikers cannot score some goals.
There was
an air of inevitability about the manner in which Liverpool went in
front after dominating the first quarter of the game. Half-chances came
and went, and Kuyt was closest of all in the 22nd minute, hitting a
fierce drive against the bar after a neat one-two with Gerrard. Six
minutes later the visitors built a move of notable patience from the
back, 21 passes flowing between red shirts until Albert Riera's cross
rebounded to Fabio Aurelio for a centre to the far side, where Muamba
allowed Kuyt to head in unopposed.
Had Robbie Keane tapped in
Kuyt's low cross from four yards almost immediately afterwards, instead
of somehow miscuing, Bolton's task would have been immeasurably harder.
Having failed to force Reina into a save, they changed the system to a
straight 4-4-2, committing Johan Elmander further forward, and thought
they had equalised just before the interval.
Inevitably, the
chance followed a set-piece, in this case a corner from the left. Three
Bolton players stood unmarked, crowding Reina, who pushed one of them,
Nolan, out of his way before the kick was swung over and headed in by
Gary Cahill.
To the home crowd's fury, the referee agreed with
Benitez that Nolan had obstructed the goalkeeper. With Gardner winning
free-kicks by running at a defence in which Jamie Carragher was
deputising at right-back, Bolton enjoyed their one good spell over the
next quarter of an hour. Elmander, who has managed only one goal in
eight games since arriving at the Reebok, had a shot from an acute
angle beaten away and Gardner, sent clear by Kevin Davies, slipped
while side-stepping the goalkeeper and skewed his shot wide.
Liverpool
held out, however, and slowly re-established control. Gerrard
unwittingly emulated Keane by jabbing wide from the easiest of
positions after Torres crossed, but when the Spaniard toyed with Andy
O'Brien before setting Gerrard up again, a glancing header settled the
visitors' nerves.
In an eventful last 10 minutes, Jussi
Jaaskelainen saved well from Torres and the excellent Xabi Alonso,
Torres and Lucas Leiva missed badly and at the other end Gardner, clear
again, lobbed over the bar.
No comments:
Post a Comment