Newcastle 1-0 Liverpool
Liverpool crashed to a sixth defeat in ten league games at St James' Park on New Year's Day, to leave their title ambitions hanging in the balance.
Only two changes were made by Gerard Houllier to the starting line up from Sunday's draw with Arsenal, with both changes forced upon him due to injury and suspension.
Michael Owen was replaced by El Hadji Diouf, while Igor Biscan started only his second league game of the season, the first of which was also up in the north-east, when Liverpool took on Sunderland last month.
After heavy rain in the area during the days leading up to the match, a late pitch inspection was required by referee Dermot Gallagher before the game was given the green light to go ahead, and to the relief of those supporters who had made the 3 hour journey up to Tyneside, Gallagher gave the all clear with just less than two hours before the scheduled kick off time.
With the pitch in such a terrible condition though, the game was never going to live up to the expectations of those hoping for a similarly entertaining match as many of the previous meetings between the two sides over the ten years of the Premiership, and goalscoring chances were few and far between at either end, with the referee's notebook seeing more first half action than either 'keeper, as Gallagher booked a series of Liverpool players during a rather dull first half.
Steven Gerrard was first into the book after only 140 seconds, cautioned for a late challenge on Olivier Bernard. Biscan almost followed Gerrard in being shown a card on 6 minutes when he caught Aaron Hughes when attempting a sliding challenge, though Dermot Gallagher was quick to reach into his pocket less than a minute later, when he harshly booked Salif Diao for a challenge, despite Diao appearing to have got his foot to the ball.
John Arne Riise would surely have been the third Liverpool man to go down in the referee's book had his rash challenge on Shearer not been so soon after the previous two bookings, though the Norwegian's poorly timed tackle did give Newcastle their first opportunity to have a shot on goal, with the free kick being conceded right on the corner of the 18 yard box.
Laurent Robert stepped up, and his fierce left foot strike went stright through the three man Liverpool wall consisting of Cheyrou, Diouf and Baros, who all jumped away from each other to leave huge gaps for the ball to creep through, and with a slight deflection off Baros, Kirkland was helpless to prevent Newcastle taking a lead with less than 13 minutes on the clock.
That lead could have been doubled on 22 minutes, when Acuna and Bellamy played a neat one-two to get in behind the Reds' defence, and only a brave block by Kirkland denied the Magpies from making Liverpool's task even more difficult.
Not until 32 minutes did Liverpool have a shot themselves, though Steve Gerrard was unable to test Shay Given with a long range shot.
Despite starting to get more into the game during the latter stages of the half, when Liverpool started to enjoy a lot more of the possesion, the Reds just weren't able to create anything which was to cause any problem for Newcastle, and the final shot on goal of note came on 41 minutes, when Alan Shearer hit a 25 yard free kick narrowly wide of the post and out for a goal kick.
The Reds looked more likely to threaten Newcastle's goal in the second half, with Baros wasting a good opportunity early in the half, though the frustration of a couple of Liverpool players managed to see them added to the ever increasing list of Reds' who were on yellow cards. El Hadji Diouf saw his name taken after thowing the ball down in anger having seen the referee award a goal kick to Newcastle, when clearly a Liverpool corner should have been given.
And later in the half, it was Diouf's international team mate, Diao, who went onto see red for a second bookable offence after a reckless tackle just yards away from the dugout.
Neil Mellor was introduced early in the second half and the 19 year old was close to scoring on a couple of occasions during his time on the pitch, and was perhaps unlucky not to have won a penalty on the 71st minute, when he was hauled down by Bernard but the youngster somehow managed to pick himself up and get a shot on goal, which was well blocked in the end, with Liverpool winning a corner from which nothing came of.
Having already brought on Mellor and Smicer to replace Cheyrou and Baros, Houllier's final change of the evening was to bring on Gregory Vignal for his first taste of Premiership football of the season, replacing El Hadji Diouf who had been given a final warning from Dermot Gallagher, having earlier been close to recieving a second yellow for a foul.
With the ball spending almost the entire last quarter of an hour at the feet of a Newcastle player, and in the Liverpool half, the Reds struggled to create any chances to grab a late equaliser, and only a free kick from Steve Gerrard 25 yards from goal looked likely to test Given, though Gerrard bent the ball a couple of yards wide of the post to the cheers of the home crowd.
Newcastle held on to their lead though, to record a ninth stright home win in the Premiership, leaving Liverpool with no league wins since early November.
With Liverpool's next Premiership game not until January 11, the Reds have a chance to concentrate on FA Cup and Worthingtop Cup games before facing Aston Villa with the aim of ending the league form which is now just four defeats from being the worst in the club's history.
