Liverpool handicapped in title race

In the first half especially Spurs were quicker to the ball and more physical than the Reds, yet it seemed Dowd spent most of his time ticking off Liverpool players.

We barely looked like scoring and if Robbie Keane had taken the chances he was presented with the game would have been out of sight.

Losing the first goal just before half time was hardly unexpected; the rocket shot from Assou-ekotto leaving Reina no chance.

We expected some sort of response from Liverpool in the second half - to be truthful it was hard to imagine us playing any worse.

We certainly came out with more focus and finally Glen Johnson managed to do what we had been expecting him to do all day and attacked the Spurs box with purpose. Gomes hurtled out of his goal and as Johnson tumbled it was clear it was a penalty. Gerrard steps up and makes it one-one and we all thought we could now build on this and go forward to get a winner.

Wrong. Just a few minutes later the centre of our defence went AWOL as Bassong was allowed to drift in and power a header past Reina and we were behind and chasing the game again.

Eventually the ineffective Babel was replaced by Benayoun and we finally managed to exert some sustained pressure on the Spurs defence. As Rafa continued to chase the game Voronin replaced Kuyt, who for me had been our man of the match. He'd played during the week for Holland against England and may have been tired so his substitution was surely more about tactics than his performance.

Voronin was then involved in what should have been our opportunity to equalise. In the 85th minute he raced through into the penalty area to pick up a great ball from Benayoun, Assou-ekotto who had scored Tottenham's first goal barges him to the floor without making any effort to play the ball.

Penalty? Not in Phil Dowd's opinion. In my view he is the type of ref who only sees what he wants to see. Literally seconds later he gave a foul to Spurs for a challenge that had less of an impact than the barge on Voronin. Then in the 87th minute Assou-ekotto controls the ball in the box with his arm from a cross by Torres, again no penalty. Rafa had already gone ballistic because of the first non-decision and in the 90th minute Sammy Lee was ordered from the field, presumably for having a go at the fourth official.

That certainly will be one handicap for Liverpool this season if we have to play both the opposition and the officials every week.

Many of our current problems though are of our own making, or should I say the making of our American owners.

On Sunday, Spurs had started with Jermain Defoe and Robbie Keane up front. On their sub's bench they had Peter Crouch, Roman Pavlyuchenko and even David Bentley to augment their attack.

Unless the Americans release cash to increase our squad strength then we could struggle to keep our place in the top four, never mind challenge for the title. It seems the Americans are our second handicap.

Hicks and Gillett have been riding the Champions League gravy train since they arrived and that revenue is helping to pay for the debts they have saddled us with. Drop out of that money-spinning completion - the same competition that the Arab consortium backing Man City are spending mega-money to get into - and to say we would have problems is an understatement.

It's unthinkable that the club would not be competing regularly in Europe's major competition and the Americans need to wake up and ensure that the squad has the resources to compete.

Personally, and I think many Liverpool fans feel the same, I am convinced that our American "owners" would be quite happy to keep the club in the Champions League money-trough and not necessarily win anything. Just spend enough to keep the money rolling in.

Well the problem this year chaps is that you have not yet spent enough to give Rafa the opportunity to keep the opposition at bay, never mind win a pot.

All the supporters can see the problem, we can see that the squad needs to be strengthened and yet no steps are being taken by the Americans to protect their investment. Strange.

Are they gambling that the squad that finished second last time out is sufficient to turn the trick again? Maybe they are, the problem is if we suffer injuries to key players then other clubs could elbow us out of the way if our squad struggles to cope. I thought Americans were smart businessmen with a keen will to win?

It seems as usual that the passion and will to win will have to be shown by the same key team members, the manager and the supporters.

Our mantra used to be "first is first and second is nowhere". The Americans would do well to adopt that instead of leaving Rafa to continually have to say "show me the money".