Lacklustre Liverpool fall to Saints (ESPN article)

by Dave Usher for ESPN

It's probably fair to say that this defeat has been coming. Picking up results when not playing well is something that every successful team needs to have in its locker, but at some point you've got to start performing or those good results will inevitably dry up.

While results have been exemplary, Liverpool have not produced a good 90 minute performance all season. The closest to it was an impressive 75 minutes against Stoke on the opening day, but the football has gotten progressively worse week by week since then, culminating in that poor second half at the Liberty Stadium on Monday followed by this horror show against Southampton.

All of Liverpool's games this season have been on a knife edge; the wins could easily have been draws and the draw could so easily have been a loss. The law of averages suggests that when you are involved in so many tight games, it will eventually catch up with you and that's precisely what happened this afternoon at Anfield, as a well-drilled and confident Southampton side did a job on a disappointing Liverpool.

Typically, there was not much in it and the result could easily have gone either way. It may have turned out much differently had the Reds gotten the penalty that should have been awarded for a first half trip on Daniel Sturridge, or if Steven Gerrard's free-kick was a fraction further away from Artur Boruc's outstretched hand. Close games are decided on such fine margins, so far the rub of the green has been with Liverpool. Today it wasn't.

Read the article here.