Reds and Gunners level at break

Liverpool 1, Arsenal 1 (half-time)

Harry Kewell struck with a cracker to give Liverpool the lead at Anfield.

But despite dominating long spells of the first half, the home side found themselves level at the break after skipper Sami Hyypia deflected an Edu effort into his own net.

Arsenal were struggling to get a foothold on the game and almost conceded a second to Kewell on 23 minutes.

Finnan’s cross was nodded down by Riise, but the Aussie hooked high over from 12 yards.

Jerzy Dudek was then forced into a diving save to turn away a Thierry Henry drive, while Liverpool were still fuming about a tackle from behind by Aliadiere on Diao that referee Graham Barber failed to penalise.

Kewell’s pass found Owen 20 yards out and his attempted lob over Lehmann finished on the roof off the net.

Then on 29 minutes, Gerrard whipped in a free-kick and Owen lunged forward to send a near-post header wide.

It looked like Liverpool needed to score again while they were on top because Arsenal were going to find some way back into the match.

And when Smicer fouled Ray Parlour out on the right, Robert Pires curled the free-kick into the box and Edu emerged from a mass of players to make contact.

The effort was going wide until it bounced in off Sami Hyypia.

It was tough on Liverpool, but as Arsenal began to come back into the game with some quickfire passing, they almost grabbed a second when Henry stepped over a Pires cross for Parlour to blast wide on 39 minutes.

Three minutes from the break Smicer limped off to be replaced by Anthony Le Tallec.