Potent spell works its magic

And so, as Liverpool roll on, Manchester City continue to roll over. Teams on fine runs are accidents waiting to happen, but Liverpool cleared a tricky hurdle in some style yesterday as they are carried forward by the confidence gained from each outing.

As the campaign hurtles towards its sharp end, Gerard Houllier's team is still locked in combat on four fronts and with so little time between key fixtures they might just forget how to stop winning.

"We have done well in the cup competitions this season, we have enjoyed them," said Houllier after learning his side face a trip to either Southampton or near-neighbours Tranmere Rovers in the tournament's quarter-finals.

An uninspiring, 35-mile stretch of invariably clogged motorway is all that separates the great cities of Liverpool and Manchester and yet, while the reds of the former and the blues of the latter currently share the same grand stage in footballing terms, they actually have little in common.

Both enjoy fine support and both have a rich pedigree, but, arguably, there the similarities end; those who decry the Premiership as a cash-conscious haven for sport's nouveau riche should remember that there are haves and have-nots even among the elite.

In the days leading up to this tie, the City manager Joe Royle had made great play of the fact he was lacking eight, possibly nine, senior players.

Had they been miraculously restored to health late on Saturday evening they would not all have played yesterday, of course, but statistics, however distorted, remain an under-pressure manager's most dependable ally.

If Royle was down to the bare bones, his opposite number yesterday had far too many bodies to play with.

Luxury is when you can take your team to Rome, beat comfortably the Serie A leaders and then make four unforced changes. The Frenchman must be the envy of his peers.

The rotation of household names with fragile egos comes easily to Houllier these days and so out went Robbie Fowler, Gary McAllister, Nick Barmby and Michael Owen whose brace had done for Roma last Thursday.

But shuffling your pack becomes akin to a pleasure when you have so many aces at your disposal and while Liverpool's football never flowed quite as it did in the Olympic Stadium, it was always going to be too much for a City defence which seemed to be peopled by leaden-footed men of enormous girth.

City struggled from the first whistle and, had Liverpool not chosen to lift a collective foot off the accelerator pedal after sweeping into an early two-goal advantage, all the arguments would have been gathering dust long before the interval.

Although much of Liverpool's early football was mesmerising, they required a slice of good fortune to underscore their superiority. Well, that's the way it looked, anyway.

Seven minutes in, Jari Litmanen released Vladimir Smicer with the first of many sublime touches. As Smicer worked his way into a shooting position he was knocked to the ground by the City goalkeeper Nicky Weaver - or maybe he was not.

Adamant that Weaver had made no contact, City, to a man, protested. It was all to no avail though and Litmanen stroked home the penalty.

"It wasn't a penalty and without going into too much detail it was fiction, a ridiculous decision. That is the last thing you need when playing at Anfield," said Royle.

Just five minutes later City were undone for a second time, Emile Heskey collecting Litmanen's magnificent through ball before steering home low.

And then, strangely, Liverpool stopped playing. Royle's teams are rarely pretty or sophisticated, but they never give up and so a competitive edge was restored to an afternoon which had looked to be dead in the water.

The outcome was briefly placed in some doubt when Andrei Kanchelskis curled a shot just inside Sander Westerveld's far post.

Liverpool increased the tempo of their game and duly prospered, again by way of a penalty for another Weaver foul on Smicer. No arguments this time though and, with Litmanen having been substituted at half-time, Smicer did the honours, crisply and efficiently.

Markus Babbel turned home a neat header from a Christian Ziege free-kick with five minutes remaining and Shaun Goater steered in a very late consolation for the visitors, but, by that point, Liverpool had switched to autopilot, conserving their energies in readiness for the arrival on Thursday of Roma.

Liverpool: Westerveld, Henchoz, Hyypia, Carragher, Biscan, Babbel, Ziege, Litmanen (Barmby 45), Hamann, Heskey (Fowler 85), Smicer (Owen 76). Subs Not Used: Arphexad, Vignal. Goals: Litmanen 7 pen, Heskey 13, Smicer 54 pen, Babbel 85.

Man City: Weaver, Wiekens, Morrison (Grant 60), Prior, Dunne, Tiatto, Granville, Kanchelskis, Haaland, Huckerby, Goater. Subs Not Used: McKinney, Edghill, Taylor, Wright-Phillips. Booked: Haaland. Goals: Kanchelskis 29, Goater 90. At- tendance: 36,231.

Referee: G Poll (Tring).