Result: Man United 2 - 0 Liverpool

It all went wrong for Liverpool today (and me as I’ve been sick and trying to catch up on posts!) as the Reds went down 2-0 at Old Trafford courtesy of goals in either half from Paul Scholes and Rio Ferdinand. Blegh.

Defensive mistakes created Paul Scholes goal while not much could be done to stop Rio Ferdinand’s second as Liverpool yet again failed to score away form home, our only goal now coming through Robbie Fowler’s penalty against Sheffield United on the opening day of the season.

Speaking to Sky Sports after the match, Benitez said

In the first half we didn’t have a lot of problems and then we conceded a goal. Against a good team like United that is always a big problem. When you see the players working as hard as they work, you cannot blame them, if you make a mistake, you make a mistake.

The loss now leaves us a grand total of 11 points behind United in the league.

Scholes was making his 500th appearance for United today, the former England man taking two attempts to poke Ryan Gigg’s ball into the back of the net about 5 minutes before half time. Whatever was sloppy about Scholes’ goal was made up for through Ferdinand who blasted into the top corner after skipping past Jamie Carragher’s poor clearance inside the box.

Liverpool were OK at best, not really troubling United in any aspect of the pitch but when we had the chances (through Riise, Alonso, Kuyt and Gonzalez) we simply couldn’t take advantage of them and paid the price. Overall I think Liverpool showed United too much respect and didn’t play with the heart and tenacity you would expect from a Reds vs Reds clash.

United top Chelsea on goal difference while Liverpool now sit unhappily in 11th spot in the table with a nice sum of 11 points out of 9 games. Nice sum - yeah right.

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