LIVERPOOL FC 2 MANCHESTER CITY 2

Liverpool can't seem to buy a victory at the moment.
A campaign which began with huge expectation, following on from our hugely unlucky second place in the Premiership last year, threatens to fritter away into the dust.
Granted, Man City at home is a tough game for any big side these days, but the way they controlled large portions of the second half was telling.
In truth, we didn't deserve the three points and it was City who were the ones kicking themselves for not holding out for a win.

We were always going to struggle without the effervescent Johnson, the width of Riera and the class of Torres, but the paucity of our back up options really has been exposed in recent weeks.
Add to that a Gerrard still not fully fit, our only other midfielder of craft Benayoun not properly recovered from his hamstring, and it's a squad devoif of the quality that cannot nearly match the likes of Spurs, Man City, never mind Arsenal, Man Utd and Chelsea.
As for the game, Liverpool were yet again hampered by set pieces. As much as Skrtel should be praised for beating Adebayor to score his goal, his failure to get nowhere near Adebayor for City's opener was staggering.
Nobody was marking the big striker, but rather the defenders were patrolling their 'zones'.
But the quality of the cross was good, and Skrtel couldn't make up the ground in his 'zone' quick enough to put in any sort of discernible challenge.
Please, oh please, oh please, can we just go back to breathing down an opponents neck at corners and free kicks?
This defensive suicide is killing us. But then it'sa nothing new is it?

Buoyed by that, City started to take over the game, and their second was composed with genuine quality.
That said, it came from another Skrtel mistake. The Slovak had the ball near his own corner flag, but allowed the indefatigable Tevez to harry him off the ball, and The Argentinian's probing ball into Wright Phillips sett them on their way.
As much as Skrtel was great last year (yes, I sung his praises from the rooftops), he is in a poor run of form at present and is not worth his place in the side.
Agger is clearly the best centre half at the club, and his injury was not only bad news from a solidity point of view, but also with regard to distribution from the back.

Elsewhere, Mascherano seems to have recovered from a crisis of confidence and is right back on song at the moment.
Shame, there's nobody else giving him the help he deserves.
Ngog, optimistically, is looking a huge lot better than in previous months, but he's still at novice level and not the sort of player we should be relying on.
As for Kuyt, with big talents out the side, we need the Dutchman to really take a starring role.
But it seems beyond him. Dirk (God love his attitude and coomitment) is great complimenting top drawer players, but when it comes to him to picking up the conductor's baton, there's just not enough there.

Babel was given a start, but an apparent injury did for him..(Gerrard's shake of the head and refusal to look at the Dutchman as he traipsed off spoke volumes) and Lucas showed plenty of his trademark endeavour, but hasn't enough guile and class to open up well-drilled defences.

It's tough to see how we've gone from nearly men for the Premiership title, to Europa league candidates in just six months.
Put simply, while the big clubs, other than Liverpool, showed rare signs of fallibility last season, they are largely right back on song now.
While they have pushed on, we've taken two steps back.
Chuck in a build-up of injuries, and Liverpool's first eleven, not long ago as good as any in the league with eveybody fit, looks weak.
To see Defoe looking majestic for Sours the other night was painful - the lad could have been snapped up for an affordable fee when he was still at West Ham.
What we would do for a midfield with the artistry of Lennon, Huddleston, Modric, Kranjcar, Jenas, Palacios...and Spurs are a side who won't even get near the title.

Yes, I'm writing this while on a downer, but it's almost criminal to see what's happened to Liverpool in 2009.
We're stuck between a rock and a hard place - the Yanks won't give Benitez the cash to really compete with the big boys.
Yet, signing cheques for the manager doesn't necessarily guarantee quality that will win trophies.
For every Torres, Mascherano and Reina, there's a Dossena, Babel, Lucas, Nunez and Kuyt.
How do you operate a club when everybody views everybody else with suspicion? When nobody has real faith in what the other person is doing, despite what they might proclaim publically?
Unless something drastic happens at Anfield, no sort of silverwear is heading to L4 this season.
This season should be used to rebuild, and rebuild fast. Make some realistic, and no doubt tough, choices about personnel, and act decisively.
Or we might have to get used to not just 12 months of rebuilding, but 24, 36 or 48 months of assembling a squad from scratch.