Zverotić late show keeps Young Boys in the hunt
Thursday, November 22, 2012
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Liverpool FC 2-2 BSC Young Boys
Elsad Zverotić struck two minutes from time at Anfield to earn a point for Martin Rueda's visitors and keep alive their hopes of qualifying.
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Elsad Zverotić's late strike kept alive BSC Young Boys' UEFA Europa League ambitions just when it seemed the trap door was about to open on Martin Rueda's team.
Zverotić flashed a shot past Pepe Reina from the edge of the box with two minutes remaining to earn the visitors a 2-2 draw and leave them level on seven points with Liverpool FC with one round of Group A matches to play.
Prior to the Montenegrin defender's intervention, Liverpool were on course to qualify after Jonjo Shelvey and Joe Cole had scored either side of Raúl Bobadilla's powerful half-volley. Instead Brendan Rodgers' men will travel to Udinese Calcio with their fate uncertain, albeit they only need to match Young Boys' result at home to FC Anji Makhachkala to advance.
There was no indication of the late drama to come in a first half largely dominated by a Liverpool team for whom youngster Shelvey shone in an unaccustomed central striking role. He twice sent team-mates clear but neither Cole nor Jordan Henderson, released by a lovely back-heel, could capitalise. In the end it was Shelvey himself who broke the deadlock. Cole burst into the box on a one-two with Suso, just beating goalkeeper Marco Wölfli to the return and crossing for Shelvey to nod into the empty net.
By that stage both sides had lost a defender to injury – Young Boys' Dušan Veškovac and Liverpool's Andre Wisdom – and the Swiss club might have conceded another before half-time. Instead Raphael Nuzzolo hacked Martin Škrtel's effort off the line and Suso dragged a shot wide.
Young Boys awoke as an attacking force on the restart, Zverotić firing a whisker wide before Bobadilla levelled in emphatic fashion. Collecting Alexander Farnerud's pass on his knee, he lashed the ball across Reina and into the far corner. Cole restored the Reds' lead with his first Liverpool goal since April 2011, turning on a Steven Gerrard pass inside the area and beating Wölfli with a low strike. That looked like curtains for Young Boys but Zverotić decided otherwise.
