Cisse strike gives hope to goal-shy Liverpool
This was hardly a day of unbridled joy for the European champions, however.
At Ewood Park last season, Liverpool's French international striker suffered a sickening leg break which, briefly at least, left doubts over whether he would ever play again, an injury which a moronic fringe of visiting fans used to taunt Cisse.
Playing against ten men for nearly a full hour, it was Cisse, fittingly, who won the match with a fantastic 74th-minute strike, bringing Liverpool just their second league win of the campaign and offering brief relief in a season that is threatening to become the mother of all hangovers after the euphoria of Istanbul.
Nevertheless, it was the form of Cisse and his fellow starting striker Peter Crouch which again had the local radio phone-ins chattering on Saturday evening. Cisse, himself, missed a hatful of promising chances against ten-man Rovers before finally hitting the target and Crouch continued in the same vein of form he had on England duty this week - frankly, poor.
If, as Rafa Benitez insisted after the win, there was much cause for optimism in the debut of the Cisse-Crouch pairing, it was not easy to see.
"It's another option," said Benitez of the partnership. "We were thinking about different possibilities and I decided to use this one. It is now another option that we have and this is the first step for them. We have a lot of options in attack. We can use (Fernando) Morientes and Crouch, maybe (Florent) Sinama-Pongolle. We have options."
Still, it is the quality, not the quantity, of those options that most concern Liverpool fans, given a return of five goals in seven Premiership games for the club. Substitute Morientes hardly did his cause much good by missing a gaping goal from three yards in the closing minutes and, of course, there will always be the spectre of Michael Owen, impressive for club and country of late, hanging over Anfield.
For now, Cisse, for all his apparent unrest at not being guaranteed a starting role in his favoured central striking position, would appear to be Benitez's main hope of finding goals, his winner against Rovers offering a particularly impressive example of his abilities.
After Robbie Savage brought down Bolo Zenden some 22 yards from goal, Xabi Alonso played a short, square free-kick to Cisse who struck an unstoppable right-foot effort past former Liverpool goalkeeper Brad Friedel. His effort not only silenced the tasteless jibes of those Blackburn supporters but also repaid the faith Benitez showed by handing Cisse his first league start since the meeting with Tottenham on September 10.
"I could hear them. I thought they were saying 'glass leg' or 'how's your leg,'" said Cisse of the taunts. "I was angry after what I heard and I really wanted to score a goal to show those stupid fans. It was okay.
"The Liverpool fans supported me and I want to say thank you to them. I just want all the speculation to stop now. There is really no problem between me and the coach or me and the club. I was happy for the fans and the team because we need points now but when I ran to the manager it was just a small message to people, just to show that there is no problem between me and the boss. We have a normal relationship. He showed faith in playing me today and I hope I have repaid him.
"I am happy to stay. Why would I want to leave? When you see the fans and how they support me, you cannot find supporters like that anywhere in the world. I don't know why people would say I want to leave."
However, Benitez is astute enough to know his team would quite probably not have won this contest were it not for the 32nd-minute dismissal of Blackburn's Georgian centre-half Zurab Khizanashvili, shown straight red by Mark Halsey after the referee harshly judged him to have been 'last man' as he brought down Cisse.
: Liverpool are unbeaten in their last 14 league games against Blackburn.
: Blackburn have failed to score in seven of their last nine Premiership visits to Anfield.
