16 seconds into it Danny Murphy shoots. A minute later Kuqi takes a shot. 2′ 18″ Benitez is nervously looking at his watch. Peter Crouch holds the ball & lays it off perfectly. Hyppia shoots after Gerrard’s seemingly improvised free kick, Niemi saves. Murphy seems keen to do well against his old club. Crouch wins a corner. Riise’s miskick could portend further impatience with the player. Voronin’s inswinger to Hyppia’s head. Good movement by David Healy almost got him in behind the L’pool back line. Dempsey looks quick and confident on the ball; he seems to be playing a more withdrawn role. Murphy shoots – again on target. L’pool switch point of attack from right to left and this movement leads to Riise’s sliced but rasping shot. Crouch continues to make intelligent runs off the ball; he crosses the ball he wishes he could be on the other end of. Gerrard’s aerial pass to Crouch on the left post line shows promise, but Hughes makes a very good tackle. L’pool up the tempo and movement. Benayoun is stymied. Murphy breaks up the attack. After a third of the match has elapsed Fulham are holding on. Voronin is clearly offside, despite the commentator’s denying it. Fulham caught offside after good work on their left. In this first half, despite L’pool’s dominance of ball possession, there has been little for Niemi to do, and Reina has had to make more saves. 46th minute L’pool free kick to Crouch who hits the bar with GK Niemi more or less stationary.
Niemi makes a save after good work by Aurelio. Just after an hour is played, Benayoun attempts to chip Niemi. The introduction of Babbel has provided verve-swerve on the left of L’pool’s attack. 66′ Liverpool “dodge a bullet” (we wonder if that is possible) as sub Bouazza crosses from teh left after yet more fine work by Dempsey. A minute later Voronin fires wide left after quick feet by Benayoun. 68′ and we can’t help thinking it is a mistake as Dempsey, who has been keeping the L’pool defense busy all game, is substituted for Henri Camara by the dapper Lawrie Sanchez; as we like to say, “Don’t change a drawing team.” Then there is an interesting corner routine by L’pool: from the right the ball is driven aerially but with a flat trajectory diagonally across the field to a position outside the left corner of the Fulham penalty area; though the worked corner failed at lest it showed some invention. It could have been a variant of the Manchester United-style driven corner to the D (for Scholes to hit on the volley), or perhaps it was simply a miss-hit(?) . A Fulham foray ends with Reina banging the ball downfield to the chest of Torres, who turns with the ball on his right foot, switches to his left and surprisingly hits the ball low inside Niemi’s near post. Classy. 1-0 to L’pool. So ironically it is a long ball that turns the game, precisely the tactics used by Fulham all afternoon in their search to beat the Liverpool defense. Then, three minutes later, an incorrect refereeing decision gives L’pool a penalty. The foul clearly took place outside the penalty area, and should have resulted in a direct free kick to the home team. International Football Association Board! Where is the video evidence to help the referee make these close-call decisions? On our TV screens! Gerrard scores. 2-0.
The Premier League match commentators’ claim that as the foul started outside the penalty area, and continued inside it, means that a penalty had to awarded. What is this? A new modification to the laws of the game? Law 12 has it that “A direct free kick is taken from where the offence occurred.”
Tags: benayoun, Benitez, dempsey, evidence, fulham, gerrard, International Football Association Board, kuqi, L'pool, law 12, liverpool, murphy, Reina, torres, video, voronin
