Crisis of confidence concern for leaders Liverpool

Dec 2 2008 Ian Doyle

Rafa Benitez 200

“Against Fulham, we didn’t play well, but here we had a lot of possession and were passing and moving the ball and had some chances. We just had to keep it going. If you play badly and don’t have control of the game you should be worried, but it wasn’t like that.”

Robbie Keane cut a frustrated figure throughout and momentarily held his head in his hands when it emerged he was to be substituted midway through the second half.

“All the players want to play 90 minutes, and you can’t change things if you aren’t playing,” said Benitez. “But we were thinking about different solutions and I thought David Ngog did really well when he came on for Robbie.”

The Liverpool manager also ruled out any suggestions of a January move for Michael Owen while revealing there had been no movement on his proposed new contract.

“We were waiting for a communication, but maybe we will have to finish the conversations and start thinking about just football,” said Benitez.

Meanwhile, West Ham manager Gianfranco Zola is confident Liverpool will be challenging for the title come the closing weeks of the season.

“Liverpool will still be there at the end,” he said. “I think this season is going to be a close title. Liverpool, Man United, Chelsea and maybe Arsenal will be close at the end. It makes for a better Premier League.

“There was a moment in the game when I thought we could nick a win. We had a couple of great chances on the break, but to be fair the draw was the right result.”