Houllier slogans drove Pool on: Gerrard
Liverpool, who face Leeds tomorrow, have suffered a traumatic season with the UEFA Cup the only silverware in sight.
The situation came to a head with last weekend’s disastrous FA Cup replay defeat at Portsmouth.
Since then manager Houllier has been the victim of sustained attacks by critics. The slogans produced a backlash from the team when they beat Levski Sofia in the UEFA Cup third round, first leg and there was backing from the fans for the manager during the match.
Gerrard, who rushed to embrace his manager after the goal, said: “I wanted to dedicate that goal to Gerard and all my team-mates. The manager has had a hard time this week so it was nice to get a goal and good result for him.
“As soon as I scored I turned to the bench and saw how excited he was. It was just a natural reaction for me to share the moment with him.
“We knew after the Portsmouth result what was going to happen with the fans and the media having a go at us, although we did not expect it to go as far as it did with the incident at Mellwood. I think that kind of thing made all of the lads and the fans pull together even more.”
Gerrard added: “To be honest the fans were right to be upset with us, for the way we went out of the FA Cup, but against Sofia they were brilliant.”
“It has been a good few days for me, on a personal level having become a father for the first time. Obviously, I would like to dedicate my goal to my family.”
Gerrard’s girlfriend Alex Curran gave birth to a daughter this week.
Now Gerrard knows Liverpool must build on Thursday’s victory against Leeds or the knives will be out again.
Houllier will not have the services of Florent Sinama-Pongolle (ankle), Emile Heskey (back), Vladimir Smicer (Achilles) and Salif Diao (calf) for the trip to Elland Road.
