Sensitive Sol run ragged as Liverpool tear Pompey apart

Pompey were so convincingly torn apart by a Fernando Torres-inspired Liverpool,the Kop ended up laughing at Campbell rather than jeering him.

That is not what the England defender had in mind when he expressed his wish that international footballers should not be sworn at by supporters. Indeed, after Redknapp had finished with his Pompey players, they would willingly have dived in the crowd to take their criticism.

Yossi Benayoun scored the opener after 13 minutes without a blue shirt near him, and three minutes later, Campbell and Sylvain Distin played Tweedledum and Tweedledee in a comical own goal.

After that, Pompey's first win at Anfield for 56 years was never on the cards.They rallied briefly and scored a goal after a livid Redknapp hauled off two players during the interval. But after taking a step forward, they then took two steps back with Torres applying two clinical finishes to make it 14 goals for the season.

At one stage, the Kop even burst into laughter as Campbell tried to keep pace with the Spaniard in one of the most unfair races at Anfield since Neil Ruddock was asked to marked Andy Cole.

Liverpool manager Rafa Benitez was delighted with the win, knowing his side could not afford to let the 10-point gap behind leaders Arsenal grow any wider.

"It was a great team performance and you know with Torres in front of goal, you have a good chance of scoring goals," he said. "It was important to win and to play well. We scored twice in the first half playing well.We were nervous in the second half for 10 minutes but once the third goal went in, we were able to make more chances on the counter-attack.

"Torres has shown he can cope with the physical demands of the League."

Redknapp was unhappy with his side's charitable defending.

"We were all over the show," said the manager whose side had won the previous six games on their travels. "We gave away terrible goals. Let's face it, a team like Liverpool can hurt you without us giving the chances we gave them.

"They are a terrific side, but we didn't start well, got sloppy and were punished. We came back when we got the goal at half time and I thought that there might be something in the game for us because Liverpool had gone off the boil. Then we let more bad goals in."

Portsmouth had not been able to train for two days last week because of a frozen pitch. At times it looked as if they had not trained together for two months.

Benitez picked the same XI that took the field for recent key games against Marseille and Manchester United. After three-and-a-half years in the job, maybe the Spaniard is finally settling on his strongest line-up. The writing was on the wall after 11 minutes when Torres outpaced Distin and Glen Johnson was hurt making a clearance from Dirk Kuyt.

Johnson was still off the field receiving treatment when the home side scored in their next attack. The luckless Distin slid in to tackle Torres but his clearance went straight to Harry Kewell. The Australian pinged over a first-time cross and an unchallenged Benayoun volleyed his first Premier League goal at Anfield.

If that was lax, the second was ridiculous and enough for Redknapp to launch into a four-letter tirade against Campbell and his not-so-merry men.

Kuyt's cross towards Torres caused such panic that Campbell succeeded only in sending the ball bouncing off Distin's knee and past a disbelieving James.

Redknapp had seen enough after 45 minutes and withdrew Johnson and John Utaka, sending on Lauren and Kanu. The changes meant Pompey were able to go 4-4-2 and they were rewarded just before the hour when Kanu's crossfield pass was controlled brilliantly by Benjani, who cut inside John Arne Riise and beat Pepe Reina at his near post.

Sensing his side were losing the initiative, Benitez sent on extra pace in the guise of Ryan Babel and Pompey could not cope. Javier Mascherano's pass after 67 minutes caught out Hermann Hreidarsson as he looked for Babel. James, not trusting his centre-halves, came out to slide-tackle, but his clearance went straight to Torres,who sidefooted home.

The Torres No 9 shirt even outsells Stevie G in the Liverpool club shop these days and he added to his collectors' item of great goals five minutes from time.

Jamie Carragher's cross was nodded down by Gerrard and Torres cleverly found space to volley in the loose ball.

Torres went off to a thunderous standing ovation, while Campbell was left dreading what reception he was going to get inside the visitors' dressing room.