EVENTS off the field have been enough to threaten to turn Liverpool into a laughing stock in recent weeks.

So there was no need for the players to leave the country struggling to suppress their sniggers as the Anfield outfit’s incredulous season reached new levels of embarrassment on Saturday.

Rafael Benitez’s side may have ultimately secured a comfortable and expected passage to the fifth round of the FA Cup at the expense of Blue Square South minnows Havant & Waterlooville.

But the fact they twice trailed to a team 123 places below them in the league ladder and took until the 56th minute to finally move ahead was a damning indictment of Liverpool’s current predicament.

Before the criticism, first credit to Havant.

They came with the full intention of enjoying themselves – their main concern before the game was over the number of matchday programmes each player was receiving – and did themselves and their club proud.

Those in Anfield of a certain vintage were seeing the words ‘Worcester City’ – the last non-League team to beat Liverpool in the FA Cup – flash across their minds when Havant struck for the second time in front of the Kop during an incredible first half.

Shaun Gale’s side, backed by a 6,000-strong travelling army 10 times their average attendance, merited the standing ovation from the home crowd on the final whistle.

Liverpool, by contrast, deserved the jeers that greeted their performance at half-time.

Although without the likes of Steven Gerrard, Jamie Carragher, Pepe Reina and Fernando Torres, there were still nine full internationals in their starting line-up against a team of part-timers packed with decorators, plumbers, builders and a binman.

Havant should have been hammered out of sight. Instead, the warm welcome afforded to the visitors before kick-off seemingly continued long into the game itself.

Benitez’s side might not be good enough to win the Premier League, but they’re a lot better than they are showing at the moment.

In many respects, Liverpool were on a hiding to nothing.

Had they racked up a cricket score, it would have been expected. That they didn’t merely intensifies the scrutiny on Anfield.

Of course, such cup scares are nothing new; Manchester United required a replay to beat non-League opposition Exeter City and Burton Albion in the last three years.

But it’s when put in the context of the present climate at Liverpool that Saturday highlighted the problems that are debilitating Benitez’s side.

Clearly, too many players are lacking confidence, the team lacking cohesion.

Ryan Babel began up front but was soon shifted to the left wing without ever impressing, Peter Crouch was strangely subdued despite his late goal and if anyone knows where the real John Arne Riise is hiding, Benitez would no doubt like to know.

However, the Spaniard himself cannot be absolved from blame for Liverpool taking so long to see off their plucky opponents.

His squad rotation was fair enough – any XI Benitez fielded would have surely beaten Havant – but it was nature of his team selection that perplexed. Was there really any need for a holding midfielder against such inferior opposition?

That said, Javier Mascherano was one of very few Liverpool players to reach anything like their level, driving forward from midfield with an admittedly obvious intention, particularly during the second half, of breaking his goalscoring duck for the club.

By comparison, central midfield partner Lucas flitted in and out of the game but succeeded where his fellow South American failed by curling a spectacular 27th-minute equaliser beyond Havant goalkeeper Kevin Scriven from 25 yards.

The visitors could easily have been 2-0 up moments earlier had Neil Sharp not blasted over inside the area following some flapping from Charles Itandje, whose unconvincing performance in goal – save a spectacular stop to prevent Tom Jordan dragging Havant back to 4-3 – heightened the unease among the home defence.

Havant had already exposed the inability to defend set-pieces that has crept back into Liverpool’s game.

Tired commentators will inevitably resurrect the tedious debate between zonal and man marking, but any kind of marking would have sufficed when an unattended Richard Pacquette headed Havant into a shock eighth-minute lead from Mo Harkin’s left-wing corner.

Martin Skrtel’s wayward backpass had presented the visitors with their opportunity, and it was indicative of the Slovakian centre-back’s decidedly shaky first start following his £6.5million arrival from Zenit St Petersburg.

Indeed, Skrtel inadvertently put Havant ahead for a second time on 31 minutes when deflecting Alfie Potter’s shot past Itandje after Steve Finnan had inexplicably misjudged his attempted clearance.

It was only when Yossi Benayoun found his range that Liverpool nerves began to calm. The Israeli has eased some of the goalscoring burden on Torres and Gerrard and followed his strike against Aston Villa last week with a well-taken hat-trick to take his season’s tally into double figures.

Benayoun missed an easy header early on that could have spared Liverpool an at times fraught afternoon, but expertly tucked the ball home from 15 yards a minute before half-time from the lively Jermaine Pennant’s pass to ensure parity at the break.

His second, 11 minutes after the interval, was another excellent finish from a Pennant pass that rattled in off the underside of the crossbar following a break led by Lucas and Mascherano.

Benayoun’s hat-trick – the second of his short Anfield career and a second successive treble in the FA Cup for Liverpool after Steven Gerrard had helped see off Luton Town in the previous round – was completed three minutes later when tapping in after Scriven spilled Babel’s drive.

The Havant goalkeeper redeemed himself with an outstanding stop to deny Benayoun volleying home his fourth, although Scriven could do nothing to prevent an obviously offside Peter Crouch tapping in substitute Gerrard’s cross for the fifth in the final minute.

The winning margin illustrated Liverpool’s second-half dominance as the superior Premier League fitness understandably told but, despite the scoreline, this was always going to be Havant’s day.

Liverpool, however, know they need to vastly improve if they are to have many more of their own this season.