Marseille delight at Reds draw
Marseille coach Jose Anigo said that the players had expressed a desire to play Liverpool before the Uefa Cup fourth-round draw was made.

Anigo told his club's official website: "We had a little opinion poll this morning to see who we would like to play and about 90% voted for Liverpool.

"It's a real pleasure for me to discover English football at a stadium like Anfield.

"Being home for the second leg is certainly an advantage.

"It will be a festival for the fans but be careful. Just because I say 'festival' I don't mean 'we play, we lose and we go home'."

Anigo is looking forward to crossing swords with Liverpool's French manager Gerard Houllier.

"On a personal note it will ne nice to see Gerard Houllier again. I know his job is under threat at the moment but he is still a good coach.

"What impresses me most is their attack. With [Emile] Heskey, [Harry] Kewell and of course [Michael] Owen they are very fast.

"We will have to keep our defence on their toes."

FT: Levski Sofia 2 Liverpool 4 (Agg: 2-6)
Liverpool surged into the last 16 of the Uefa Cup with a 4-2 victory at Levski Sofia - 6-2 on aggregate.

What Liverpool needed was a quick strike to deflate their hosts, and it came on six minutes from Steven Gerrard.

He anticipated a back pass from Ilian Stoyanov and raced into yards of space before rounding goalkeeper Dimitar Ivankov and sliding the ball home from an acute angle.

The visitors doubled their advantage five minutes later when Harry Kewell's angled ball from midfield was chased by Michael Owen.

The England striker sprung the offside trap and cruised into the box, before curling the ball past Ivankov with a perfect shot into the far corner.

But Levski fought back to level, determined to give their all in front of 40,000 of their countrymen.

The home side's first effort on goal eventually came on 25 minutes but Kostadin Vidolov's 20-yard free-kick sailed over the bar, after Steve Finnan fouled Sasha Simonovic.

But that inspired Sofia who worked the ball in from the left and Georgi Ivanov got the chance of a low drive across Chris Kirkland and inside the far post to pull a goal back.

Liverpool responded when Bruno Cheyrou's angled cross beat Ivankov - but also Owen at the far post.

But the Bulgarians were refusing to slip away quietly, and Georgi Chilikov took advantage of some sloppy defending to fire over from the edge of the box.

Then five minutes before the break Simonovic was given the space to smash home the equaliser from the edge of the box.

But Liverpool hit straight back when Dietmar Hamann rose to head home Gerrard's right wing corner - restoring the three-goal aggregate advantage.

Houllier's men almost sprung the offside trap twice at the start of the second half through Gerrard and Owen.

But there was plenty of defending to do with Ivanov and Chilikov more than difficult opponents for Sami Hyypia and Stephane Henchoz.

Kirkland twice had to dive at the feet of Ivanov as quick passing again splintered Liverpool's defence, with a concerned Houllier stalking the touchline at this stage.

But if there was still any fleeting doubt about the outcome, Hyypia ended it with a low header on 67 minutes from a Gerrard corner for Liverpool's fourth goal of the night.

FT: Leeds 2 Liverpool 2
Leeds and Liverpool were forced to settle for a point after an enthralling 2-2 draw at Elland Road.

Gerard Houllier's side initially led through former Leeds star Harry Kewell, yet were made to come from behind during an all-action first half as Milan Baros cancelled out goals from Eirik Bakke and Mark Viduka.

Leeds, despite being unbeaten in their last three games from which they have taken five points, remain bottom of the table, yet their optimism is on the rise.

Kewell set up Michael Owen for a fifth-minute curler which clipped Gary Kelly, while the England international later flashed a drive over the bar before the former Leeds favourite silenced the boo boys.

After a toe-poked shot from 15 yards through the legs of Dominic Matteo which an alert Paul Robinson just managed to push away, Kewell struck in the 21st minute.

Play first switched from the left flank to the right, with Baros supplying Kewell who curled a sensational 20-yard left-foot shot beyond Robinson.

But within eight minutes Leeds were level as Didier Domi, Alan Smith and Jermaine Pennant all combined to set up Bakke for a flick past Chris Kirkland for his first league goal in 14 months.

Liverpool responded with Steven Gerrard setting up Baros for a towering close-range header which crashed against the bar before Leeds soon countered to take the lead.

A Robinson goal-kick was inadvertently headed on by Sami Hyypia to Smith who took the ball on his chest before volleying a pass into Viduka's stride for the striker to then loft his seventh of the season over Kirkland.

But four minutes before the break Liverpool were back on level terms as Baros weaved his way past Domi and Seth Johnson before firing a crisp 19-yard drive past Robinson.

Smith and Owen then exchanged chances throughout the second period, with the Leeds striker ending an incisive 52nd-minute move by flashing an acutely-angled drive past the far post by an inch.

Robinson and Kirkland again thwarted Owen and Smith soon after, before the latter appeared to have won the game for Leeds in the 73rd minute.

With a chance reminiscent of his equaliser in the 1-1 draw at Manchester United last week, Smith stole in front of Stephane Henchoz in meeting a clipped James Milner cross, only for his header to crash off the underside of the bar.

Robinson, in front of the watching Sven-Goran Eriksson, then produced the save of the game in the 87th minute as he was at full stretch to tip away a goal-bound Dietmar Hamann drive from 30 yards.

Although Leeds were under pressure in the closing stages, it was they who had the final chance to win the game in the second minute of injury time.

Domi met an inswinging Stephen McPhail corner with a powerful downward header, only for Jamie Carragher to clear off the line.

Liverpool 2 Levski Sofia 0
Liverpool eased the pressure on under-fire manager Gerard Houllier with a hard-fought 2-0 win over Levski Sofia in their Uefa Cup third round, first leg tie at Anfield on Thursday.

Two second half goals in the space of three minutes by inspirational captain Steven Gerrad and Harry Kewell put the Reds in a commanding position ahead of next week's return in the Bulgarian capital.

For the tie Houllier reverted back to a midfield that included Danny Murphy, Milan Baros and Harry Kewell with flair players like Anthony Le Tallec, El-Hadji Diouf and Bruno Cheyrou consigned to the substitutes' bench.

The visitors, who included a host of Bulgarian national team players, took an impressive record of a single defeat in all competitions this season into the match.

And it was not hard to see why the Bulgarians have been so hard to break down as they packed their midfield and generally employed very defensive tactics with only Georgi Ivanov, their top scorer, committed forward, and Asen Bukarev man marking Steven Gerrard.

This made life very difficult for the Reds as they were denied space by being quickly closed down by the opposition.

Their best chance of the first half fell to Baros after 15 minutes when he rose at the far post to send a Murphy corner centimetres wide.

In contrast the Bulgarians looked threatening whenever they got forward and after a swift break in the 19th minute Golovskoy saw a 20-yard effort deflected inches wide with Chris Kirkland beaten.

With Kostadin Vidolov pulling the strings in midfield the visitors were looking increasingly dangerous forcing Liverpool to defend resolutely.

However, it all changed in the second period as the hosts finally found some inspiration.

The deadlock was finally broken on 67 minutes by Gerrard after Murphy's corner was played short to Kewell and then Steve Finnan. The Irishman's cross was nodded out by Bukarev but only as far as Gerrard who fired the ball into the bottom corner from the edge of the box.

Three minutes later Liverpool doubled their lead from another Murphy corner. Again played short to Kewell, the skilful Aussie somehow mustered up an angle 35 yards out before lashing a stunning shot into the far top corner of the net.

Levski responded with a host of substitutes but to no avail as Liverpool held firm, the Kop responding by singing Houllier's name as the game drew to an end.

Reds must find Euro force - Thommo
Liverpool assistant boss Phil Thompson has warned Uefa Cup opponents Levski Sofia they could face the "full force" of a Reds backlash.

It is back to the drawing board after a short rest for Liverpool, with the club's number two Thompson telling the players not to feel sorry for themselves and to pull their socks up to save their season.

Gerard Houllier's right-hand man admits that gloom has descended on Anfield but insists there is no time to let it settle with crucial games coming thick and fast.

The Reds must pick themselves up from the disappointment of losing at Portsmouth in the FA Cup on Sunday in time for Thursday's visit of Bulgarian side Levski Sofia.

Thompson said: "We're all very down and obviously everyone is very upset at going out of the cup.

"We gave the lads the day off on Monday to gather their thoughts. Sometimes it's good to have time to dwell on it so the lads have had 24 hours to reflect.

"But we have to stop feeling sorry for ourselves and saying this always seems to be happening. We have to find out the reason why and put it right - starting Thursday.

"We have to stay extremely positive and I hope it's going to be Levski who feel the full force of our reaction. We have had one too many of 'one of those days'."

Houllier must get tough with his flop stars
By Tommy Smith

Like so many fans, I was gutted with the result at Portsmouth.

But the Reds just did not perform when it mattered.

There was talk of them being under pressure, but that is a load of nonsense. were playing a Portsmouth side of AN Others.

Pressure comes when you have fought your way to the top of the league or through to a cup final and you know you are nearly there. Pressure comes when you are battling against relegation.

Pressure is not when you are miles away from the top and the bottom of the league.

1977, we won the league, then played badly and lost to Manchester United in the FA Cup final. We were told in no uncertain terms we had to perform to win the European Cup a few days later. That was pressure!

Liverpool should be fighting for first place in Premiership, but we are never going to be there with the current squad. We should still be in the Cup, but the players, again, were not good enough.

I believe Gerard Houllier thinks his players will perform, but he has too many poor ones.

He has been protecting his players for too long, and his excuses are wearing a bit thin.

Gerard stated that when some of his key players were back things would be different, but the situation has not improved much.

In the past, Liverpool had one or two really good players, and the rest may not have been as talented but they were proud to put on the red shirt and work their socks off to achieve success.

Now, the team has some top players, but not enough to carry the rest through.

When we played we had a plan and to hell with the opposition. Sometimes we lost, but we stuck to the system.

I just cannot see what the Houllier system is.

There are too many Anfield players in the comfort zone. More often than not, the manager feels his stars play well. You never hear him slagging off his players, but some o f them are not performing.

If you mollycoddle players, saying they are playing well, they will believe it.

Ultimately, it is the players who determine how successful a manager is.

Houllier needs to take action. If his ideas about the game do not change and he does not start winning games his job could be on the line - that will not be because of fans' displeasure with him, but because of the lack of success of some of his signings, like El-Hadji Diouf, Salif Diao, Bruno Cheyrou and Igor Biscan.

The next few months will be crucial. The Reds must finish fourth and do well in the UEFA Cup.

More disappointments will heap further pressure on Houllier and put a question mark on Michael Owen's future, too.

Liverpool vs Levski Sofia - Match Preview
European football returns to Anfield on Thursday night as PFC Levski Sofia from Bulgaria are the visitors in the first leg of the UEFA Cup 3rd round.

Both sides are unbeaten in the competition so far this season. Levski had to play a qualifying round against Atyrau of Kazakhstan, winning 4-1 away and 2-1 at home. Levski won both legs of the next round 1-0 away and 4-0 at home against H Ramat-Gan of Israel. They faced a much tougher task in round two, only going through on away goals against Slavia Prague. The first leg in Czechoslovakia ended 2-2 and the goalless draw in Bulgaria saw Levski through.

The player Liverpool will have to watch out for is forward Georgi Ivanov who has already scored 4 goals in the competition. The 25-year old averages over a goal every two games for the club and has one Championship medal and two National Cup winners medals to his collection.

Sofia currently stand second in the their national league and are three points behind the leaders Lokomotiv Plovdiv. Sofia have won their last six league games and are unbeaten in their last nine. They have only been beaten twice all season, both times by Plovdiv, once in the league and once in the National Cup. Sofia won 3-0 away at Vidima Rakovski last week in their latest league game to keep the pressure on the leaders.

Liverpool may need a goal or two in the first leg as Sofia have not tasted defeat at home since August 2003 when Dinamo Kiev won 1-0 in a qualifying round of The Champions League. They have since gone on a run of 24 games without losing on home soil.

If Sofia are on top of their game at the moment, then the opposite can be said of Liverpool. Dumped out of the FA Cup by Portsmouth on Sunday, the UEFA Cup is now the last chance of silverware this season.

This season's UEFA Cup has had an Eastern European flavour so far for Liverpool, Slovenia's Olimpija Ljubljana were despatched in the first round and Steaua Bucharest of Romania sent packing in the next round. Scoring goals has also been a problem for Liverpool in the competition so far, with only Michael Owen (2), Harry Kewell (2), Antony Le Tallec, Emile Heskey and Djimi Traore finding the net in the four games played.

It remains to be seen if Houllier continues with the five-man midfield or goes with two strikers now that Milan Baros is back. Florent Sinama-Pongolle was carried off on Monday night during a reserve outing and will be out for at least a week. Harry Kewell and Emile Heskey are both slight doubts for the game with ankle and back injuries. Chris Kirkland looks set to continue in goal. Senegal's El Hadji Diouf will return to the squad but his compatriot Salif Diao is out injured.

Liverpool pay for Owen miss
By Nick Szczepanik

Portsmouth 1 Liverpool 0

If there is anything positive for G?rard Houllier, the Liverpool manager, to take from this FA Cup fifth-round replay defeat by Portsmouth, it is that he will not have to visit Fratton Park again this season. On a ground where they had produced one of their most anaemic performances of the campaign in a 1-0 defeat in the Barclaycard Premiership in October, Liverpool offered a display yesterday that showed little improvement.
Against a Portsmouth team missing as many as 13 players through injury, suspension and ineligibility, Liverpool had no excuses for failing to advance to a sixth-round tie at home to Arsenal. While Harry Redknapp was forced to field five free transfers among his makeshift starting XI, Liverpool's only significant absence from their expensively-assembled squad was the suspended Harry Kewell. Yet it was only when they had gone behind to Richard Hughes's first goal for Portsmouth, after 71 minutes, that they began to show any urgency.

Their confidence in front of goal was as low as usual. Even when Michael Owen was handed a chance to score from a penalty by a poor refereeing decision, he saw his kick saved by Shaka Hislop. Houllier, despite only a second defeat in 13 games, was all too aware that a growing section of the club's supporters would be baying for his job. "I know I'm going to get slaughtered, but I don't feel under any more pressure now than before, " he said. "It isn't about me, it's about the team. I can't blame my players. Right up to the end they could have equalised or won. We had enough chances to win. I don't think Chris Kirkland had a save to make before their goal."

In fact, Eyal Berkovic tested Kirkland with a free kick in the first minute, but the first half quickly subsided into a dull succession of misplaced passes and aimless running. With Yakubu Ayegbeni a lone forward, Portsmouth seldom threatened, but they could blame injuries for their shortage of attacking options. Liverpool seemed hampered by their own formation, which saw Owen ill-supplied by an amorphous five-man midfield, with Emile Heskey looking more unsure than most of exactly what he was supposed to be doing. Heskey, though, came closest to breaking the deadlock before the interval. With 37 tedious minutes gone, Steven Gerrard ran at the Portsmouth defence for once and slipped the ball inside Petri Pasanen for Heskey to run on to. Hislop, however, was out to block the England forward's shot.

Heskey was replaced by Milan Baros at half-time and the Czech Republic striker made an immediate impact. In the opening minute of the second half, Gerrard flighted a free kick towards him from the right, and Matt Messias, the referee, pointed to the penalty spot as a hand made contact with the ball. After lengthy consultations with his assistant, prompted by impassioned pleas from Berkovic, he was correctly persuaded that it had been Baros, and not Linvoy Primus, the Portsmouth defender, who had handled. "If you can't tell the difference between Linvoy's hand and Baros's hand -- one's black and the other's white -- then we haven't got a hope," Harry Redknapp, the Portsmouth manager, said. "He'd have looked the biggest fool in the world if he hadn't changed his mind."

Baros was also the central figure on the hour when he was ruled to have been tripped by Matt Taylor inside the penalty area, even though the Portsmouth player had clearly won the ball -- "the most diabolical penalty decision I've ever seen", according to Redknapp. However, Hislop celebrated his 35th birthday by dropping to his left to save Owen's poorly struck kick. "Justice was done," Hislop said. A team with Liverpool's goalscoring problems cannot afford to look such gift horses in the mouth, and they paid after 71 minutes. Yakubu was given all the time he needed on the edge of the penalty area to measure a square pass to the left to the unmarked Hughes, who had room to take a touch and hit a low shot past Kirkland and into the far corner with his left foot.

Hughes, 24, a former Scotland Under-21 captain and Arsenal youth team player, has been a bit-part player since joining from Bournemouth two years ago. He had come on as a substitute at half-time as an emergency left back, and might have gone off again with a twisted knee before his goal, but was able to do what was beyond any of Liverpool's internationals.

Too late, Liverpool finally seemed to realise the peril of their position. A header by Jamie Carragher went wide and Hislop produced two more superb saves to touch Owen's low shot round a post and tip Gerrard's near-post header over the crossbar.

Houllier defended the efforts of his players, but may need someone to defend him from increasingly frustrated fans. The first leg of their Uefa Cup tie against Levski Sofia, at Anfield on Thursday, now takes on even greater significance. "We've got the Uefa Cup, that's what I said to the boys," Houllier said. "We are disappointed, but we have a good opportunity to get back into more high spirits." The supporters, though, want results.

Hard times as Houllier has five days to save his season
By Gabriele Marcotti

Most people in football insist Gerard Houllier is a lovely man, and an intelligent one too. "Very clever, very bright," says Harry Redknapp, manager of Portsmouth, who host Liverpool in the FA Cup fifth-round replay this afternoon. "And a lovely guy too. Knows his football. Shame they're giving him a hard time, but that's football..."

There may well be a twinkle in Redknapp's eyes as he speaks. Even as his colleagues rally around him, many Liverpool fans have grown distinctly tired of what they consider his blend of evaded questions, convoluted excuses and, most importantly, insipid play.

If Houllier - the former schoolteacher and academic - is as intelligent as some of his friends suggest, he is living proof that it takes more than brains to manage well. The man, who like Stalin, speaks in terms of five-year plans is now in his sixth season at Anfield. Only one full-time Liverpool manager since the 1950s has a worse record in terms of wins, draws and losses than Houllier - Graeme Souness. Even Roy Evans has a better record.

Yet, when he speaks, there is an earnestness to his manner which so far has convinced the Liverpool brass that he is the right man to take the club forward, even as the Cup treble of four seasons ago begins to gather dust.

Houllier gave himself a few days off in his native France following the disappointing Anfield stalemate with Ports- mouth last Sunday. It was a chance to decompress, to get away from the barrage of criticism which inevitably followed.

Rather than facing the fire - something which, to be fair, he's done many times before - he issued the following Stalinesque communique: "Everyone on the playing and coaching staff is determined and committed to putting this proud football club where it needs to be. I have always said that we are in this together, and if we are to achieve our aims, that is the way it has to be."

Drastic times call for drastic measures and the importance of today's trip to Fratton Park cannot be overstated. Barring a simul-taneous ebola outbreak at Old Trafford, Highbury and Stamford Bridge, Liverpool will not win the Premiership, which means that, in the next five days - the FA Cup clash today and the Uefa Cup encounter with Levski Sofia on Thursday - another season could go down the toilet at Anfield.

This time, the repercussions could go well beyond Houllier and his job security. Michael Owen, whose contract expires in June 2005, will not commit unless he believes the club are "headed in the right direction". Another campaign without silverware, and he will put himself on the market, most likely to be sold this summer, since the club won't want to lose him on a free.


Auxerre striker Djibril Cisse, the man originally earmarked to partner Owen (in happier times) is now the man who could replace him, but even that move, once certain, is now in doubt. Liverpool have agreed a fee in principle with the French club, but they have until the middle of July to change their minds, something they may well do if Houllier is sacked and replaced by a manager who has other priorities or if they fail to raise enough cash by selling Owen.

But that's just the beginning. Sami Hyypia, Dietmar Hamann, Emile Heskey and Vladimir Smicer, the backbone of the Cup treble side, all go out of contract in June 2005, just like Owen. All have hefty wage packets and all but Heskey are the wrong side of 30. Difficult choices will have to be made and, under normal circumstances, they would already know if they were being offered new contracts or whether they will be put up for sale this summer. But these are not normal circumstances.

Houllier may have a contract for next season, but it's painfully obvious that Liverpool have not committed to him. Nor can they afford to re-sign the four above mentioned players, until they are sure who will lead them next season. The last thing they want to do is sign them up and then find themselves with a new manager who may not want them.

Houllier knows this all too well. A manager who has the backing of the board is free to build for the future, which means extending player deals and working to bring in new players. It's a luxury he does not have and will not have unless he keeps the silverware hopes alive by getting past Portsmouth and Levski Sofia in the next five days. Typically, he won't admit it.

"Taking into consideration everything that happened to us this season, such as losing several key players for long spells with serious injuries and being the victims of some very dubious refereeing decisions, I think it's a credit to us that we are even able to challenge for fourth place in the league and are still in the running both in the FA Cup and Uefa Cup," he says, indicating that his glass, at least, is always half-full.

But a generation of Liverpudlians over 30 who remember the European Cups before the Souness-Evans nightmare are making their displeasure known, with vocal shows of dissent, both at Anfield and on the road.

There's a certain irony in the fact that today's crucial test will come at Fratton Park, where they lost 1-0 earlier this season in what was probably their worst performance to date. It can be a chance for redemption or an incubus revisited.

The good news is that Houllier is slowly reassembling his troops. Danny Murphy is back in contention after his injury and Salif Diao and El Hadji Diouf have returned from the African Nations' Cup. Milan Baros, sorely missed after finally living up to his potential earlier this year, is also close to full fitness, though Harry Kewell is suspended.

Meanwhile, things are bleak in the Portsmouth camp, where Redknapp maintains that he is "struggling to find 16 senior pros". Pompey have no fewer than 14 unavailable players, including Anfield old boy Patrik Berger, veteran Teddy Sheringham and new signing Ivica Mornar.

Perhaps Houllier can take some solace that, while he believes events are conspiring against him in Liverpool, the big fella upstairs is lending him a hand. Now if he only could help Heskey hit the back of the net.

Owen seeks short extension at Anfield
Michael Owen intends to ask Liverpool for a one-year extension on his contract at Anfield when talks over a new deal open next month.

Owen's representative, Tony Stephens of the SFX group, returns to work after a sabbatical on March 1 and is expected to enter negotiations seeking only a further 12 months on the England striker's #60,000-a-week deal. That would tie the 24-year-old down until the summer of 2006 and give him extra time to assess Liverpool's progress after a frustrating season on Merseyside.

The club are likely to be reluctant to pursue that course given the uncertainty which has surrounded their leading goalscorer's future for much of this season. The Liverpool chief executive Rick Parry's gut instinct would be to tie the England vice-captain down to a longer deal, particularly with Real Madrid retaining an interest in luring him to the Bernabeu, yet this could still prove a productive starting point for negotiations.

The forward has made no secret of his desire to play in the Champions League.