Barry proves committed to Villa

NEWS ROUND-UP:GARETH BARRY gave the strongest indication yet that he is committed to Aston Villa by playing and scoring in their 4-1 Uefa Cup second qualifying round first leg win against FH Hafnarfjordur.

In front of watching England coach Fabio Capello in Reykjavik, Barry - whose appearance means he would be cup-tied in the Champions League group stages should he move to Liverpool - capitalised on some terrible defending to stab Villa's opener in the fourth minute.

Ashley Young and Gabriel Agbonlahor also scored first-half goals at the Laugardalsvollur Stadium and although Matthias Gudmundsson pulled one back, Martin Laursen's second-half header secured his side a comfortable lead to take back to Villa Park.

Barry has been a target for Liverpool all summer and lost the captaincy for criticising Villa manager Martin O'Neill's handling of the move. O'Neill insisted Gareth Barry wanted to play in last night's game despite the implications: "He's our player, and he wanted to play in the game, and we think he's mentally tuned into it so that's all that matters," said O'Neill.

However, O'Neill admits the latest development does not necessarily rule out a move to Merseyside for the player, adding: "I wouldn't be particularly sure until the transfer deadline passes what might materialise, so we'll see."

Meanwhile, Dutch striker Dirk Kuyt spoke for an embarrassed Liverpool squad by vowing that they will not play as badly again in Europe.

Liverpool retreated from their Champions League mauling in Belgium, as close to their Waterloo in European competition as they would want to get. And Kuyt promised: "We will not play as badly as that again, we must improve and we will improve."

Around €15 million of Uefa prize-money is now riding on the second leg of their third qualifying round against Standard Liege on August 27th.

Failure to reach the group stages then would even leave a question mark over the future of manager Rafael Benitez, who could probably hear American knives sharpening as he witnessed Liverpool's inept 0-0 draw against Belgian champions Standard Liege on Wednesday night.

Only Jose Reina's penalty save and his all-round defiance prevented the three or four-goal victory Liege deserved.

Kuyt, along with out-of-touch Robbie Keane, was taken off in the second half at the reverberating Maurice Dufrasne stadium, home of a club who had not won their domestic title in 25 years.

And the Belgians made it clear they wanted to grab with both hands the chance of a first-ever Champions League adventure.

Kuyt said: "It was a bad performance. We tried to do our best and it was not good enough. The forwards just did not have enough of the ball, and our man of the match was Pepe Reina, that says everything about us.

"We will need a big improvement at Anfield. We know we did not play our best game against Liege, we know that as a team."

A small, mainly silent Liverpool following high in the rafters of Liege's intimidating stadium watched in horror as the five-times European champions were battered from start to finish.

Kuyt said: "We struggled. We could not pass the ball to our team-mates anywhere near enough. It was a difficult night and difficult to know what really went wrong. But the good thing was a clean sheet and that will give us the edge in a fortnight for the second leg.

"We know it was not our best game. But we want to step things up and we know there is quality in the team, we have shown that in pre-season and now we must show it in competitive matches too.

"We have some big games coming up. One of those is on Saturday at Sunderland. So we must not play like this again.

"Now we are looking forward to Saturday and the first league game at Sunderland to show who we are and what we are.

"As for the Champions League, fortunately we are still in the tie, but we definitely have to show better form than we showed in Liege. We need to score, we have to play better and we will."

Benitez said: "You must give credit to Liege because they were aggressive, competitive and played very well.

"It is different to playing pre-season friendlies, but we were lucky and the only good thing was that we did not concede a goal.

"But we know now what we have to do at Anfield. We will have had a few more competitive games and we will have a more people available.

"Javier Mascherano, Lucas Leiva and Ryan Babel will be back with us, Fabio Aurelio should be fit by then and Steven Gerrard will also be available and fully fit this time, as will Martin Skrtel.

"We have to thank Pepe Reina, and make sure we are really ready for the next game."