Liverpool's hopes of wresting the Premier League title away from Manchester United suffered a major setback on Sunday when they allowed the champions to get away from Anfield with a 1-0 win.
Carlos Tevez's goal just before half-time settled a contest that Liverpool dominated for most of the 90 minutes and could, with better finishing, have had wrapped up by the time the Argentinian claimed his ninth goal of the season.
From the outset, Liverpool had looked the sharper of the two sides and the predictably robust opening exchanges were punctuated by a couple of decent half-chances for a side that was unchanged from the line-up. But with the half-time whistle approaching, United suddenly found another gear and, after Hargreaves had won a corner on the right, took the lead with the help of some uncharacteristically shoddy defending by their hosts.
With Liverpool's defence anticipating an inswinging delivery from Giggs, the Welshman instead drilled a low ball to Rooney, who was, inexplicably, completely unmarked on the edge of the area. Liverpool's attempts to quickly get back on level terms after the restart were spearheaded by Gerrard, who thumped one drive into van der Sar's midriff before volleying Kewell's astute cross wide. Kewell made way for Ryan Babel with 25 minutes left and the Dutch winger went close with a shot that flashed across van der Sar's goalmouth ten minutes later.
But with United largely content to sit back and soak up the pressure, it was a counter-attack from the visitors that produced the best of the second-hand chances.
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