Earlier England striker Emile Heskey had fired Liverpool into the lead, only for Louis Saha to level the scores from close range, before Luis Boa Morte was dismissed in the dying seconds for a crude challenge on Sinama-Pongolle.

And Murphy told Sky Sports Premiership Live he was not nervous about the late responsibility.

He said: “I like taking penalties – I actually enjoy it.

“Luckily for me Michael (Owen), who would have taken it, had gone off about 10 minutes earlier.

“More importantly for us it was a great win because we’ve had a sticky patch lately. But that’s three wins on the spin now – and that’s a good confidence booster.

“Maybe a point wouldn’t have been a bad result for us – but we always though we had it in us to win the game.”

Murphy is pleased Gerard Houllier’s decision to play more attacking football is paying off.

He said: “We’ve started trying to play a bit more attacking football and you saw that in the formation today.

“Hopefully we’ve got the balance right now, winning games is what we want to achieve.”

Team-mate Steven Gerrard added: “We were very disappointed after losing at Portsmouth, our fourth defeat of the season, so it’s time to go on a run and pick up points – and I thought we deserved them today.”

However, the England midfielder acknowledged the contribution of goalkeeper Jerzy Dudek, who made two good saves to deny the home side at Loftus Road.

Gerrard added: “He’s bounced back after a bit of a blip last season and has been very strong for us this season.”