Liverpool bowed out of the Europa League on away goals despite a thrilling 3-1 win over Zenit St Petersburg.
Hulk's early away goal proved critical on Thursday as Zenit booked
their place in the last 16, with Luis Suarez's two free-kicks and Joe
Allen's strike not enough to complete a memorable comeback.
Liverpool started on the front foot, but found themselves behind
after 19 minutes when Hulk capitalised on a terrible mistake from Jamie
Carragher to stun the home fans.
There looked very little danger when Carragher collected the ball
midway inside his own half but his attempted back pass towards Pepe
Reina was terribly underhit, allowing Hulk to race clear and slide the
ball under Reina and leaving Liverpool needing to score four goals if
they were to progress.
Liverpool gave themselves hope on 28 minutes when Daniel Agger was
felled on the edge of the box and Suarez drilled his free-kick low
through the Zenit wall and into the net past Vyacheslav Malafeev.
Liverpool reduced the arrears in the tie and went in front on the
night two minutes before the break, with Joe Allen finding the net.
Jose Enrique worked a neat one-two with Jordan Henderson before
crossing for Allen, who saw his initial effort saved by Malafeev, but he
was on hand to fire home the rebound from close-range.
Liverpool picked up where they left off at the start of the second
half and they levelled the tie on aggregate just before the hour mark
with a stunning free-kick from Suarez.
The Uruguayan curled his effort from 25 yards round the wall and into
the top right-hand corner past a stunned Malafeev to send the home fans
into raptures.
Liverpool went close to grabbing a fourth goal on 72 minutes when
Malafeev flapped at a cross from Enrique and the ball dropped to
Gerrard, who hit his shot into the ground and the ball bounced up
goalwards only for Malafeev to produce a fine acrobatic save to turned
the ball behind.
Reina kept Liverpool in the tie a minute later when he got down low to keep out Hulk's powerful effort from the edge of the box.
Liverpool threw everything at Zenit in the closing stages, but they
could not find a fourth goal as they saw their European hopes ended in
dramatic fashion.
