Match report from Liverpool Daily Post

THERE'S just one niggling doubt about Dirk Kuyt's well-established status as an Anfield superhero - trying to pinpoint exactly what his special power is.

He swooped to the rescue once again on Saturday, answering an early distress call from his people and pulling them out of the swamp that was Reading's packed back line. And in the process he displayed another destructive weapon in his armour.

We know about the hard work, physical presence, unselfishness, ability to seemingly glide through the air - all the Superman-style characteristics that have already ensured his face is etched on a 'Dutch Master' banner looking on to the Kop.

But thankfully for Liverpool, it wasn't all so smooth and seamless when Kuyt was called into action to deliver a fourth straight home win.

The Dutchman displayed his liking of the simple, the scrappy, the less attractive side of the striker's art - but two close-range tap-ins was just what Liverpool needed on an afternoon when the free-flowing football from the previous week's victory over Aston Villa was replaced by a need to extract sweat rather than style.

Credit Reading for that, because despite their lack of attacking ambition they were still very much in the game until the 73rd minute when Kuyt steered in his second, his fifth in seven starts.

But then the fact that their only effort on target after they fell behind in the 14th minute was direct from Ibrahima Sonko's bouncing throw-in tells you that Liverpool's near-perfect home record was never likely to be disrupted.

Not exactly the busiest of Jamie Carragher's 300 games for Liverpool then. The toe he used to deflect wide Kevin Doyle's seventh minute effort was the most strenuous defensive duty he carried out. From that point, his landmark game was always looking more likely to be memorable for his first goal of this century than for anything he achieved in the area where he has been so dominant in his previous 299. The fact that both he and Sami Hyypia often found themselves in possession in the Reading half and even in positions to shoot indicates just what Liverpool were up against.

Steve Coppell sent his team out with five at the back and four across the middle, only the trickery of Glen Little and Steve Hunt on the flanks giving Doyle any hope of spoiling Carragher's party. Still, it was a formation Coppell seemed pretty relaxed about when he pulled out his mobile phone to punch in to a text message as the game kicked off. Presumably, he was satisfied that his Premiership novices were perfectly set up to avoid a repeat of the 9-0 humiliation Coppell suffered here in his days as Crystal Palace manager.

He was right of course, but it didn't stop him shuffling uncomfortably in his seat when Kuyt wrecked the gameplan by tapping in Peter Crouch's knockdown. The fact that Coppell reached for the phone immediately to make a frantic call to the bench suggested he was ordering a change in tactics - he might as well have ordered a takeaway pizza.

For all Little's efforts, Reading simply put too little effort into their attempts to make a contest of it and Liverpool are having no problem brushing aside limited opponents at Anfield this season.

Only the draw with Blackburn Rovers spoils what would have been a 100% record on a ground where Liverpool haven't lost for more than a year.

The European invasions from Turkey and France have been repelled, as have Reading themselves in the Carling cup just 10 days previously. Since then, the way Liverpool shrugged off the unbeaten record of Aston Villa and minimal threat of Bordeaux suggested they were there for the taking on their return.

Okay, so a nine-goal margin was never likely to return to haunt Coppell, and the 7-0 Liverpool needed to overtake Everton in sixth was also hoping for too much.

But the progress they are making up the table suggests talk of the title race still being on is not as fanciful as it first appears. Once Arsenal is out of the way on Sunday, the toughest away games the league can throw up will all be crossed off the calendar.

Of course, Rafael Benitez will be quick to point out that no games of any kind are easy, and he knew what he was up against on Saturday when he started his next run of consecutive changed line-ups (the figure now stands at one for those who are counting) by going in without a holding midfielder.

With Reading sinking deeper than the iron men at high tide on Crosby beach, there was of course no need for one, although Mohamed Sissoko isn't left out of the line-up lightly.

It's less than a week since the Liverpool manager described him as the team's battery - and if batteries aren't included things don't tend to work.

But with Carragher and Hyypia advancing to the point where they were effectively covering Sissoko's switch to the bench, this was the ideal time to give the Mali man a rest and the machine clicked into working order.

All of which allowed Jermaine Pennant and Bolo Zenden opportunities to impress, but their contribution was more significant for allowing Steven Gerrard more freedom in the middle than for any direct impact they had.

It was this situation that led to the vital early breakthrough as Gerrard found space to chip the ball in to Crouch, who towered over his marker, and aware that Marcus Hahnemann had advanced into no-man's land nodded across goal for Kuyt to slide in his fourth of the season.

Gerrard caused more havoc with a floated free-kick, Hahnemann doing well to keep track of the ball's flight as it somehow evaded a mass of heads, to palm it away.

Carragher's drive whistled into the crowd before Kuyt was wide with two headers.

The pattern continued into the second half, although Reading did start this in a more positive frame of mind. However, victory was secured when Hahnemann fumbled Crouch's header from Gerrard's corner and Kuyt steered in the rebound.

It won't have escaped Benitez's notice that both Kuyt's goals came as a result of his strike partner's forehead, the pair surely benefiting from a third consecutive outing as the front two.

It seems that almost involuntary understanding that forwards strike up is easing one aspect of the manager's selection headache.

The type of chances that gave Kuyt his double were the sort he could now do with falling to him on someone else's turf.

He has yet to open his account away from home, but then in the Premiership no Liverpool player has found the net in an away game since Robbie Fowler's opening day penalty at Sheffield United.

A chance to get rid of those away-day blues comes in the form of an away day at the blues of Birmingham City on Wednesday in the Carling Cup fourth round - although their current run of six successive wins doesn't suggest they will be ripe for a re-run of the seven-goal hammering Liverpool inflicted in the FA Cup earlier in the year.

But any confidence boost Liverpool can get on the road will get them motoring nicely for their first journey into the baying colosseum that is the Emirates Stadium.

A real superhero setting if ever there was one, so Arsenal need to beware the flying Kuyt - he's circling overhead.

[Liverpool line-up on LFChistory]

READING: Hahnemann; Ingimarsson, Sonko, Sodje (Bikey 70), Gunnarsson (Seol 80), Shorey; Little Sidwell, Harper (Oster 88), Hunt; Doyle. Subs: Long, Federici.
BOOKINGS: Hunt 53, Sodje 64.

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