Fulham 1-3 Liverpool Match Report
Daniel Sturridge scored his first senior hat-trick to silence the crowd on his return to West London. Berbatov opened the scoring against the run of play for Fulham, but the lead didn’t last long as Sturridge provided the goals for a makeshift Liverpool side that played some tremendous football and could have scored more.
The Team
Brendan Rodgers was forced to change his team from the one that faced Everton last weekend, with Captain Steven Gerrard ruled out due to needing surgery on a recurring shoulder injury, and Daniel Agger also unavailable through injury. Luis Suarez was serving his third match of his lengthy 10 match ban. Martin Skrtel was also missing through illness.
Reina kept goal, with Johnson, Wisdom, Coates, Carragher and Downing his defence in front of him. Coutinho, Lucas, Henderson and Shelvey made up the midfield and Sturridge started as the lone striker.
The Match
The match started at a pedestrian pace with Liverpool dominating possession without threatening the Fulham goal and Schwarzer remained untested until Coutinho stung the keeper’s hands with a 20 yard drive.
Fulham had barely touched the ball and they surprisingly took the lead in the 32nd minute when Riether’s cross was headed past Reina by Berbatov at the back post.
Fulham’s lead was short lived when Sturridge got on the end of a Wisdom clearance before making a yard for himself to fire an unstoppable shot past Schwarzer. Both sides went in level at half-time, but the second half brought a higher tempo and more entertainment to the match.
Enrique came on for Wisdom as Liverpool switched to a 4-4-2 formation after the break. A slack pass from Henderson presented Kacaniklic with a chance but he shot wide.
Then Fulham thought they should have had a penalty when Ruiz’s cross struck Lucas’s outstretched arm , but referee Halsey waved play on. Two minutes later Liverpool were ahead when Coutinho’s wayward shot found Sturridge who calmly stroked the ball past Schwarzer.
Moments later Sturridge robbed Hangeland but Schwarzer made a great save to deny the striker his hat-trick. Then at the other end Reina made a superb save from a Hughes header in a rare Fulham attack.
Next it was substitute Borini who went close when he hit the post with a powerful drive. But Liverpool eventually made the game safe when Sturridge netted his hat-trick after lifting the ball over the onrushing Schwarzer after being sent clear by Coutinho.
Sturridge left the field with the match ball after producing an impressive performance.
Summary
Liverpool had an unusual look about them with Gerrard, Agger and Suarez all missing, but it didn’t stop them producing an impressive performance away to Fulham, especially after going behind. Liverpool dominated for long spells and they should have scored more goals in the second half. Sturridge was on fire, and Fulham couldn’t cope with his movement and his 3 goals were superbly taken. Coutinho once again provided some defence splitting passes, highlighted by the pass for Sturridge’s third goal. But overall it was a great display by Liverpool and their end of season form gives great encouragement for next season.
The Kopite View 
Mate,i didn’t watch the game but i thought rodgers was wrong to ve played jonjo and wisdom ahead of suso and enrique tbh. By the way i was vindicated on how coward rodgers is. Why in the entire epl the best defenders who are class and familiar with back3 are nastatic and coates so i can’t get it why rodgers refuse to accommodate coates in his plans. Cos the 352 is 1 of the variation of the 433 system. By the way, how did coates fare? This was the moment for suso to play in the absent of gerrard and as 4 shelvey he just need 3or4 epl loan unelse he must be sold. These are the reasons why i keep clamouring for jurgenKlopp and rodgers just can’t stop me from clamouring cos i just can’t see rodgers to do well in the so call big games mate. He must prove me wrong then.