Bold Benitez drives Fulham towards exit

The Craven Cottage fans who were pinning their survival hopes on another act of generosity by Rafa Benitez and his team left disappointed after goals in either half from Jermaine Pennant and Peter Crouch comfortably saw off Roy Hodgson's Championshipbound side.

Last year, a weakened Liverpool team dominated the game but failed to score and a 1-0 victory saved Fulham from relegation and Lawrie Sanchez, temporarily at least, from the sack.

But a reprise never looked likely once Pennant had put Liverpool in front yesterday while Bolton's 1-0 victory at Middlesbrough has left Hodgson's team five points adrift of salvation.

Beating Birmingham in a fortnight remains a necessity. But now a club, who have won just twice in 19 months away from home, must pick up at least one and probably two victories from games at Manchester City and Portsmouth.

"It's not looking good," said Hodgson. "I can't say our situation hasn't deteriorated after this result and Bolton's victory.

"It's a bleak situation but we'll continue to believe, to hope, to fight until the mathematical impossibility means we are relegated.

"All we can hope is that with nine points left to play for, we'll be good enough to get all nine points."

It is a hope about as forlorn as Everton's aspiration to overhaul Liverpool's eight-point lead in the race to qualify for next season's Champions League, a competition Benitez can now focus on trying to win again as the first leg of the semi-final takes Chelsea to Anfield on Tuesday night.

The Liverpool manager said: "It looks like we're nearly there. We need a point and Everton need to win every game, but we must be careful.

"Now we can focus on the next game, the Champions League game. We needed to do a good job. My responsibility is to try to use my squad to win every game."

But Benitez's threat to set his lawyers on Neil Warnock after the Crystal Palace manager renewed his attack on the Spaniard's integrity suggests he remains sensitive about criticism of last year's team selection.

And for all that Warnock is possibly the most disliked manager in the history of English football, he did have a point.

The fact that a Liverpool side featuring stellar names such as Gabriel Paletta and Emiliano Insua had enough chances to win that match cuts no ice with Warnock or with those who cite the Premier League rulebook's requirement for clubs to put out full-strength teams.

Yesterday Benitez made eight changes from the line-up who had started the 3-1 win over Blackburn six days earlier and it was Pennant, one of the replacements and a survivor of the previous year's ignominy, who gave Liverpool the lead.

In the 17th minute, Lucas Leiva had all the time in the world to slide a pass forward for Pennant to chase and as Norwegian centre-half Brede Hangeland turned with all the speed and grace of a North Sea trawler, the winger also had plenty of breathing space to choose his next move.

Kasey Keller apparently did not anticipate that it might be to shoot inside his near post and the Fulham goalkeeper stood and watched as the ball arrowed high into the net just to his left.

Fulham did their best but it never looked like being good enough. They had no cutting edge and Danny Murphy and Jimmy Bullard were no match for Lucas and Javier Mascherano, who ran the game from the centre of midfield.

Liverpool, despite rarely getting out of second gear, had had halfchances to extend their lead early in the second half.

But Fulham had managed just one off-target header by Clint Dempsey before Crouch put the game to bed with 20 minutes to go, turning and shooting through Keller at leisure after Pennant's pass.

Anfield old boy Murphy had a chance to cut the deficit, but Liverpool were in no mood to give away as much as a goal after last season's generosity, and Jose Reina saved with his leg, before twice keeping out efforts by substitute Erik Nevland.

At the final whistle, the words of the pre-match song, "Viva El Fulham", were cruelly appropriate. When it was written in 1975, "the First Division is where we want to be" meant the club was looking upwards in English football's old structure.

Barring an unlikely sequence of results, it will be taking a step towards League One.