Buzzin Football

rafa benitez

Liverpool manager Rafa Benitez was full of praise for his team following Saturday’s 6-1 thrashing of Hull City at Anfield in the Premier League, leading the Spaniard to claim “We can beat anybody”.

The harsh reality of course is quite different, having beaten the current Premiership whipping boys Hull City, who are at the other end of the league table, Liverpool ventured to Florence for the Champions League group game last night and found that even recent history counts for nothing in football.

Fiorentina outplayed the Reds on the night in every department, causing a headache for Benitez, who claimed after the game that his side would never play so badly again.

Liverpool will bounce back for sure, but they now face an enormous uphill battle to progress from the group, facing back to back games against leaders Lyon in the next round of games.

So just what went wrong in Florence? Steven Gerrard and Jamie Carragher have both agreed that Fiorentina were the better team, but the excuse that ‘we just didn’t turn up’ will be a bitter pill for Benitez to swallow.

Benitez says his team knew exactly what to expect as they had watched the opposition previously and nothing was new, but did urge his players to get to grips with the offside law.

Adrian Mutu was in an offside position when the onside 19-year-old Jovetic went through on goal to puthe home team t ahead and Benitez was left bemused by his shaky defence and added: “It is the new law -and another mistake by us.

“If a player is in such a position he is offside and it makes it difficult for defenders who are distracted by him but the law says the other player coming from deep is fine, he can go through. Just another error by us.”

Liverpool face Chelsea at Stamford Bridge this weekend and Liverpool will no doubt be fired up for the Premier League encounter and Benitez has promised fansthat Liverpool will definitely have a different mind set, “I believe you will see a different Liverpool in that match, a totally different performance with a different mentality.

Fiorentina coach Cesare Prandelli was in joyous mood after the game as his side maintained their unbeaten home record so far this season.

“We were fantastic, that is the best performance I have seen by a Fiorentina side in the four years I have been in charge, Liverpool did not play well but that was because of the performance of my team. We were outstanding, especially in that first half when we were just fantastic.”