A convincing 4-0 home victory for Liverpool against Fulham on Saturday maintained the club’s recent Premiership improvement and featured Jamie Carragher’s first league goal in nearly eight years.
The Liverpool and England defender scored his team’s second goal as they amassed three in 12 minutes early in the second half to kill off a dogged Fulham team who had been seriously hampered by the enforced removal of the injured Papa Bouba Diop soon after the restart.
Carragher slid in at the far post after Daniel Agger had flicked on a corner from Steven Gerrard for his first league goal since he scored in the 7-1 demolition of Southampton in January 1999. It was only the third he has netted in the Premiership in just over 300 appearances.
That was just one highlight of an enjoyable second half for home supporters, already buoyed by the talk of a proposed £450-million takeover of the club by Dubai International Capital, who had representatives at the game, which would help facilitate the building of a new stadium and team strengthening for manager Rafa Benitez.
It also marked the second consecutive 4-0 league win for Benitez’s team at the start of a month which the Liverpool manager believes will be crucial to his team’s fate this season.
After a frustrating first half for Liverpool, the second half opened with them in far more energetic form, aided by the absence of Diop who had performed admirably sitting in front of his back four throughout the first period.
In the opening minute of the second half, Dirk Kuyt hurriedly stabbed a right-foot shot at the keeper before both he and Craig Bellamy missed a superb cross from Jermaine Pennant.
But once players other than the out-of-form Liverpool front pair began to appear on the end of chances, the floodgates opened.
In the 53rd minute, the rout started when Ian Pearce used his hands to charge down Kuyt’s fierce shot at point-blank range, a somewhat harsh decision given that he was merely raising his hands to cover his face.
Nonetheless, after Gerrard saw his penalty well saved by Jan Lastuvka, the captain was calm enough to take advantage of a fortunate rebound and place the ball back past the keeper.
Agger and Bellamy both missed good opportunities from Gerrard corners before the England midfielder cut into the area himself and forced the Fulham keeper into a fine save.
On the hour, however, the contest was over when Carragher struck and, five minutes after that, Agger was again involved in a goal, his cross finding the head of Luis Garcia whose looping effort drifted over the Czech keeper’s head for number three.
In the closing minutes, Liverpool could have added more, Lastuvka diving to keep out a fine Gerrard volley from a Pennant centre, before, in injury-time, substitute Mark Gonzalez curled a left-foot free-kick directly into the Fulham goal from fully 25 yards.
The second half action was in stark contrast to the first period in which Liverpool’s front pair of Bellamy and Kuyt were particularly disappointing.
As early as the fifth minute, Liam Rosenior was called upon to perform an acrobatic goalline clearance to prevent Garcia’s hooked shot from going in, the defender then blocking Pennant’s follow-up attempt.
There was momentary concern shortly afterwards when Fulham’s American forward Brian McBride met Moritz Volz’s cross with a shot which Jose Reina tipped around his post with his fingertips.
But, comfortable on the ball and dogged in the tackle as Fulham were, the contest soon settled into a pattern of Liverpool domination punctuated by the odd mildly-threatening Fulham counter. – Sapa-AFP