There was more bad news for Steve McClaren yesterday, when Yossi Benayoun, whom many hoped would inspire Israel against Russia next Saturday to bolster England's chances of qualifying for the Euro 2008 finals, suffered a groin injury.
The Israeli captain picked up the injury as Liverpool breathed new life into their Premier League title challenge with just their second home win of the season.

"Yossi has picked up an injury and it is very, very doubtful that he will join up with his country," said Liverpool manager Rafael Benitez. Benayoun confirmed he will have a scan and has cancelled the flight to join up with his national side.

For Liverpool yesterday, it was a case of after the feast, the famine. Or a more realistic diet. Even a side as flimsy as Fulham were able to muster substantially greater resistance than the skeleton of a team masquerading as Champions League opposition on Tuesday.

Liverpool needed the mouth-watering quality of Fernando Torres, a second-half substitute, to break the anxiety of the Anfield gallery and Fulham's defiance. Victory was confirmed by Steven Gerrard's conversion of a harsh penalty.

Liverpool were far more sparing than against Besiktas, manoeuvring themselves into promising positions only to misplace the final ball or find Antti Niemi in magnificently unco-operative mood.

Gerrard endeavoured to drive his team with characteristic determination, Benayoun gave glimpses of the menace that terrorised the Turks and Andrei Voronin was something like the player Benitez often acclaims.

Fulham can scarcely have believed their luck. They offered token reprisals and came within nine minutes of acquiring an unlikely point.

But the introduction of Ryan Babel and then Torres gave fresh impetus to Liverpool's play and the Spaniard finally wrong-footed Niemi.

It takes something out of the ordinary to convince Benitez he should pick an unchanged team and Liverpool's Champions League record 8-0 victory against Besiktas was, by definition, precisely that.

And yet it was only when Benitez shuffled his expensive pack that he found a winner. He said: "The problem was they were really compact and you must give credit to their goalkeeper. We had to be patient. We needed fresh legs. Babel and Torres gave us that."

His opposite number, Lawrie Sanchez, envied Liverpool's resources and still felt Torres was fortunate. "I thought we would get a point. We restricted them to long-range shots and then they introduced a bit of talent. But he mis-hit it and it was a really soft goal. And it wasn't a penalty - and goal difference is important to us."

Peter Crouch had the chance to push his international credentials, taking a perfectly judged pass from Gerrard in the area. But he wanted too much time to pull the trigger and Aaron Hughes took the ball away. Crouch proved himself more adept just before the break, meeting Fabio Aurelio's free-kick with a looping header that struck the bar. The lanky striker won the ball in the air again early in the second half, knocking down Gerrard's centre for Voronin to test Niemi, who proved himself up to that and many other challenges.

With another impressive save he kept out Aurelio's deceiving free-kick. But he was beaten as Torres turned inside Hughes and found a near-post gap.

Crouch appeared outside the area when he was tripped, but the referee awarded a penalty, which Gerrard converted.