Dazzling performance prompts daring ambition

Liverpool - 2 Charlton Athletic - 0: Dazzling performances are prompting daring statements on Merseyside. "In a year or maybe two, Rafael Benitez will be seen in the same league as Alex Ferguson and Arsene Wenger," said Luis Garcia in the wake of this blistering victory. "Everyone's talking about Arsenal and Manchester United but, if Benitez gets what he wants, we will be up there for the title as well."

Those at the top have been warned. Liverpool's effervescent home form has been maintained, a hapless Charlton Athletic side dismissed with ease after a plethora of first-half missed chances proved the prelude to a pair of crunched goals from distance. The Londoners departed admitting they had been spared the humiliation their insipid display deserved as Liverpool, with the best home record in the country, burst into the top five.

Little, other than the continued inability of their first-choice strikers to home in on each other's wavelength, suggests they will not continue to be upwardly mobile. There is an argument to suggest the Merseysiders are mere flat-track bullies, capable only of dismantling those lacking genuine pedigree, but they have still managed to saunter beyond four Premiership teams at Anfield with Djibril Cisse and Milan Baros hardly exchanging a pass.

Benitez has the pair rooming together at the team hotel on away trips to try to perk up their relationship. At some stage their combination play will be less about ordering room service and more about scoring goals.

In the meantime, Cisse spends his most constructive time out on the right flank, where he can at least singe opposing full backs, with Garcia moving into the centre. That switch was made before half-time here just as a barnstorming opening threatened to drift, and was maintained after the interval.

John Arne Riise, his right foot apparently obsolete, twisted his body to belt a 20-yard volley home seven minutes into the second period for his first league goal in 65 outings. Garcia, outstanding at the hub of Liverpool's crisp passing moves, then conjured a stupendous second to excuse his side's profligacy.

There is work still to be done, but Liverpool are showing real promise. "The manager knows what he wants," said Garcia. "He did it all in Spain and I believe he will do the same in England."

Benitez won the Liga title in his first season at Valencia. A repeat of that remarkable feat is unlikely at Anfield, though his new players are gelling and the mood is hugely optimistic.

Not so among Alan Curbishley's ranks. Charlton's summer transfer outlay of about £9 million represented an attempt to take the club to the next level, the calibre of players purchased designed to add extra quality to a squad that had flitted around the European qualification places for two years.

Yet only the busy Danny Murphy - a player on a personal mission - of the new crop offered any encouragement. Dennis Rommedahl was utterly ineffective and withdrawn. Francis Jeffers, riled by the home side as an Evertonian, spent more time kicking opponents than the ball.