Fratton Park - against the Botom 3 contenders

The game at Portsmouth is an ideal way to try and get back some of the rhythm for Liverpool. The side in blue is not at the top of their confidence. Gerrard, Torres, Johnson and Kuyt were all deemed completely fit. The 6th minute saw a dangerous free kick floated into the Liverpool box and the resulting loop back into Reina's path was deflected away for a goal kick.

With the Liverpool defence not at its very best, there were expected to be some long balls from the Portsmouth backline. Carragher had to use all his experience to defend one such ball against the front two fielded by Avram Grant. Dossena floated a wonderful ball for Torres in the 18 yard box. But the defence could pluck it away from his feet. Then Torres sped away from his own half to finally get a corner. But one after another, the corners were well defended, with some degree of not the best deliveries attached to both the balls. The left of Liverpool midfield once again saw the almost forgotten Italian who goes by the name of Dossena. He did look lively from the initial touches and his ability to put in good balls for Gerrard, Torres and Kuyt to attack.

Torres and Gerrard combined to pick up Kuyt inside the 6yard box but the Dutchman could not connect with the bouncing ball. That was half a chance with the ball almost at his feet. Torres went for goal in the 21st minute from just outside the box. The ball curled very well but just did not dip enough under the crossbar. That shot would have alerted the Portsmouth goalkeeper to the abilities of this Spanish striker. Once again he ran onto a left wing ball from Gerrard but could not get the slightest of touches. Any minimal contact would have diverted that ball into the goal, with the goalkeeper too close to the ball. Dossena's foul allowed a free kick to be delivered right into the upper right corner but Reina was up to it. Then a swift counter attack needed a clearing header from Agger. The resulting corner was cleared to finally move the ball away from Liverpool area.

The first half an hour had seen better organization and field play from Liverpool, but Portsmouth appeared to be more threatening from their minimal attacks on the opposite goal. They were better in the final third while we were trying to control the overall game. And the team with more attacking intent had their noses in front. A goalmouth scramble saw Reina parry a shot which bounced for Johnson to head away to safety. However the weak header allowed Belhadj to volley a superb goal from the tightest of angles. It flew inside the near post of Reina even before he could see it.

Portsmouth 1 - 0 Liverpool. 33 minutes.

Daniel Agger had the best opportunity to drive home the leveller. Gerrard free kick floated beautifully onto the far post, Agger had a free header 6 yards out. All he had to do was to direct it goalwards. And he managed to let the header fly across the goal. In the 42nd minute, Mascherano flew into a tackle onto Tal Ben Haim. He managed to hurt himself and see red at the same time. That was that for the first half. Is my curse still on ? Should I move away from the keyboard and stop writing this live report of the match.