Match Reports
Aston Villa 1-2 Liverpool Liverpool won at Villa Park for the second time this year to earn a vital three points and keep themselves on track for a championship challenge. Liverpool took the lead early on with a bizarre goal eventually scored by Jari Litmanen. After Peter Schmeichel had collected the ball quite comfortably with Smicer lurking in the area, the Danish keeper tried to get a quick throw out. But his throw bounced on the back of referee Andy D'Urso and Litmanen passed the ball into an empty net to score his second in successive games. Litmanen was Liverpool's mainplayer in the first half and had a shot soon after his goal from long range, but it did not trouble the keeper. Villa drew level after 21 minute though, and their goal came thanks to Lee Hendrie, who also scored in the previous meeting between the sides and on that occasion his goal proved to be the winner. A volley from the edge of the are by Vasselll was saved by Dudek, and at the other end, Liverpool were awarded a penalty. George Boating tripped Gerrard and Litmanen stepped up to take the spot kick. But Litmanen hit the ball straight at the post with Schmeichel going the wrong way, and the first half stayed at 1-1. If the first half was evenly matched, then Villa possibly had the edge in the second half. Ian Taylor hit the post from close range, and from the rebound, Paul Merson somehow managed to strike the ball into Riise from 3 yards out, when he surely had time to pick his shot and give Villa the lead. Vassell then tested Dudek with a long range effort but the Liverpool keeper made a finger tip save to concede the corner. Liverpool's winner came with around a quarter of an hour to go and involved the two Czech players in the line up. Berger picked the ball up around 10 yards into the Villa half, and chipped a perfectly weighted pass into the path of Smicer, who controlled with his chest before putting a tamely hit shot past Schmeichel. Nicolas Anelka came on to make his debut with 20 minutes to go, though was not too involved in the action. In other results, all other sides in the top 5 of the league picked up wins to leave the top positions in the league table looking very much the same. View match pictures from this game!
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