Tottenham Hotspur 4, Liverpool 0. This was an afternoon Kenny Dalglish and company would do well to forget. Two red cards sealed the deal for the visitors, but Spurs were the better side even when the Reds had eleven men on the pitch, dominating the midfield and going ahead early thanks to a beautiful strike by Luka Modric, who sent a loose ball crashing off the underside of Pepe Reina's crossbar with a first time shot from long range.
That was in the seventh minute, but it wasn't long until another blow befell Liverpool when Daniel Agger was forced off the pitch with a hip injury. Sebastian Coates was the replacement for the defender, making his Premier League debut, but he wasn't on the pitch for long at all before another Liverpool player departed thanks to Charlie Adam, already on a yellow card, putting his studs through Scott Parker's knee.
Referee Mike Jones had little option, showing a second yellow and sending the Scotland international off. Things settled into an easy groove from then on, with Liverpool coming up with the occasional chance of an equaliser while Tottenham were happy to hit on the counterattack, but yeah, things got worse for the visitors again. Much worse. Martin Skrtel had been having a bad time against Gareth Bale all evening, having, like Adam, already picked up a yellow card during his struggle to contain the Spurs midfield, so when he want through the Welshman's back he too was dismissed. Liverpool were down to nine, with barely an hour gone.
Within five minutes, Spurs had added two more goals through Jermain Defoe and Emmanuel Adebayor, both of whom had been guilty of missing chances that would have put Liverpool away long before Skrtel's dismissal. At 3-0, the game was totally unrecoverable, and the visitors were forced to endure Tottenham playing Barcelona-style passing football until the last minute of the match, when Adebayor was released to control expertly and volely pass Reina for his brace.
Not the Reds' finest moment, eh?