Torment for Liverpool as Gerrard's 100th 'goal' is disallowed

Steven Gerrard was robbed of his 100th Liverpool 'goal' as Stoke City's team of bravehearts pulled off the shock result of the season at Anfield.

Liverpool's jubilant players mobbed Gerrard after his early inswinging free-kick eluded Thomas Sorensen and everyone else on its way inside the far post.

Premature: Steven Gerrard celebrates what he thinks is his 100th goal for Liverpool, but the effort was disallowed.

The celebrations went on for fully 30 seconds until the players noticed that referee Andre Marriner had controversially ruled it out for offside, presumably against Dirk Kuyt although the Dutchman clearly had not interfered with play.

Manager Rafa Benitez called the decision 'unbelievable', and Gerrard was left holding his head in his hands, but the full impact of the decision only became clear at the end as Liverpool failed to overcome a side written off as relegation fodder this season.

Benitez's men forced 20 corners and had 26 shots at Sorensen's goal. But they could not break through and despite last weekend's famous 2-1 win over Manchester United, the old doubts will start creeping back at a stadium where fans still cringe when remembering last season's goalless home draw against Birmingham.

Liverpool's boss clearly blamed Marriner for the draw that felt like a defeat. 'It was a key decision because in games like this, everything changes with the first goal,' he said.

'We worked hard and had chances but sometimes you need a bit of luck or ability to break sides down in the final third. Robbie Keane had a chance and there were others, but maybe we needed to be cleverer when there were so many bodies in the penalty area. These things can happen and we have to try to learn for the future.'

Stoke's defenders managed so many heroic blocks that they are bound to be covered in bruises this morning. A point was reward for hard work rather than ability but manager Tony Pulis knows if his side show this kind of application for the rest of the season, they may be able to get out of the bottom three.

He said: 'We didn't give the players their day off last week because we knew we had to improve our defending. We had given away some bad goals recently. We worked our socks off from back to front.'

Significantly, Pulis seemed surprised when told that Gerrard's third-minute effort had been disallowed for offside. But he was happy enough to take his slice of luck.

Luck is something poor Keane is short of at the moment. The Republic of Ireland striker went closest to breaking the deadlock when his 51stminute shot from an Alvaro Arbeloa cross was stopped on the line by Sorensen.

But the statistics now show Keane - taken off in the second-half - has not scored in eight games since his £20million move from Spurs and there were the first signs of impatience from The Kop after he misplaced a pass to Xabi Alonso.

The Torres radar was also out. He sent a header wide when unmarked and gave Leon Cort the chance to block a goalbound shot late on. Torres thought he might have had the chance to win it in injury-time as he waited to meet Gerrard's cross at the far post. But veteran Stoke captain Andy Griffin, who does not even try to hide his grey hair, intercepted with a fantastic header over the bar Stoke's side were predictably stuffed with six-footers. But in the event they did not need Rory Delap's famous long throw to work. He had three goes - all dealt with by Pepe Reina - but most of his time was spent manfully scuffling in defence to great effect.

The best thing to do against a packed defence is score early. And Gerrard, whose 99th goal came against Marseille in midweek, thought he had claimed his place in history as only the fourth Scouser to score 100 goals for Liverpool. But it was not to be.

After wins against Sunderland, Middlesbrough and Manchester United, Kop fans have dared to believe that their 18-year wait for the title may be over this season. They had a perfect chance to steal a march on Chelsea and United, who meet today. But they fluffed their lines and there were groans at fulltime even though Liverpool remain unbeaten this season.

Make no mistake, this was two points dropped, and one potentially very costly decision by Mr Marriner.