Monday 3 August 2009

Espanyol crush Liverpool

Liverpool slumped to a 3-0 friendly defeat by Espanyol in the first match played at the new Estadi Cornella El Prat.

A double strike from former Chelsea forward Ben Sahar (pictured) and a first-half effort from Luis Garcia sealed the win, but Liverpool's Steven Gerrard twice hit the woodwork.

The clash was played in front of a noisy sell-out 40,000 crowd as the city of Barcelona marked the opening of the new stadium.

Reds skipper Gerrard had the first real opportunity with 19 minutes gone when he let fly with an effort from 30 yards.

The strike beat keeper Carlos Kameni but, frustratingly for Gerrard, the ball thudded on to the crossbar and away to safety.

Immediately afterwards the hosts launched a quick counter attack and took the lead through Garcia.

Former Celtic man Shunsuke Nakamura played a perfect through ball to Garcia, who held off young Spanish defender Mikel San Jose and fired past Pepe Reina.

Gerrard struck the woodwork for the second time in 10 minutes with a beautifully-curled free kick that came back off Kameni's left hand post after Fernando Torres was brought down.

Liverpool almost found themselves two goals behind after 41 minutes when Raul Tamudo timed his run to perfection and finished expertly past Reina, but the goal was incorrectly ruled out for offside.

The game became a little scrappy in the second half as both sides introduced a host of substitutions and it was not until Sahar came on that the game went beyond Liverpool's reach.

Philipp Degen should have done better as he stood appealing for offside while the Israel striker nipped in and tucked the ball past Reina with virtually his first touch of the game after 63 minutes.

Sahar then added the killer third goal three minutes from time when more hesitant defending from the visitors allowed him to slot the ball home unmarked from close range.

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