Gerrard won't dwell on double blow
Liverpool captain Steven Gerrard has urged his team-mates to forget the disappointment of a rare double defeat by getting their season back on track against Fulham in the Barclays Premiership on Wednesday night.
Gerrard’s back pass blunder allowed Arsenal captain Thierry Henry to score a late winner on Sunday as Liverpool lost ground on Manchester United in the race for second spot in the league.
Gerrard tried to find goalkeeper Jose Reina only to see the ball go straight to the in-form Frenchman who simply slotted the ball home to give Arsenal victory.
Henry had put the Gunners in front in the 21st minute but Luis Garcia had given Liverpool hope of a point when he headed home from close range after Jens Lehmann had failed to hold Gerrard’s thunderbolt 30-yard drive.
The defeat came just days after the European champions were sent crashing out of the Champions League by Benfica at Anfield and Gerrard insists it was now imperative they forget the double blow and concentrate on reviving their season.
“It has been a disappointing week,” admitted Gerrard.
“We need a big reaction now – two defeats on the spin is something we haven’t experienced for a while so we need to bounce back on Wednesday.
“At this level you can’t take defeat into the next game or you will suffer for a long time. You have got to make sure you get it out of your system so that will be the idea for me and the team to get this experience out of the system before Wednesday.
“We have got to make sure we find our feet again. It is important we finish in the top four for the Champions League next year.”
Gerrard’s error in the 84th minute came just two minutes after Xabi Alonso had been red-carded for a second bookable offence.
The England international admits he was trying to kill time in the hope of pinching a point but ended up with a repeat of his back-pass error against France in Euro 2004.
Henry was also the recipient of his ill-timed and misplaced pass on that occasion and the Frenchman was brought down by David James for Zinedine Zidane to convert the resultant spot-kick and give France an unlikely win.
This time Henry calmly rounded Reina to score and earn Arsenal three valuable points. It helped them to close the gap on fourth-placed Tottenham to just two points.
“We were gutted,” said Gerrard. “It was my fault – I will take all the blame. I hold my hand up.
“We were in a position to rob a point at Highbury, I don’t think we deserved anything more. I’ve made a stupid mistake and will take all the blame.
“I thought we played a lot better in the second half but I don’t think that over the 90 minutes we deserved to win the match.
“I thought we would have done well to go away with a point but my stupid mistake meant we went away with nothing.
“I tried to kill time and didn’t see Thierry at all. I will learn from that. The idea was to kill time and try and go away with a point because Arsenal were the better team.”
