Liverpool 2 Young Boys 2: Maligned midfielder Joe Cole was denied his chance to be hailed a hero after Liverpool conceded a late equaliser to leave their Europa League challenge in the balance..
Having led once through Jonjo Shelvey’s goal only to be pegged back by Raul Bobadilla’s equaliser, Brendan Rodgers’ side conceded to Elsad Zverotic with two minutes to go. Liverpool have to avoid defeat in Udinese in a fortnight to have a chance of progressing.
The visitors fashioned four shooting chances inside the opening 11 minutes. However, none came close to testing Jose Reina, breaking Ray Clemence’s goalkeeper’s record with an 81st European appearance.
On the half-hour, Rodgers was forced to send on Gerrard for the apparently injured Andre Wisdom. Within two minutes Liverpool were ahead. Cole exchanged passes with Suso, whose return was perfectly weighted to allow his team-mate to cross for Shelvey to head in from three yards.
Suso had two chances to double the lead before the interval, seeing one shot deflected into the side-netting and missing the target with the other while Cole saw his effort bounce off Martin Skrtel only to be cleared off the line by Raphael Nuzzolo.
Early in the second half Cole had a better chance from Suso’s through-ball but Wolfli smothered his shot and Young Boys raced down the other end to equalise. Jordan Henderson was caught on his heels when the long, diagonal pass came over to Bobadilla who controlled the ball on his right thigh and in the next movement smashed an unstoppable left-footed drive past Reina.
The arrival of Luis Suarez was not delayed much longer and when he replaced Suso new life was breathed into the forward line. Few would have suspected Suarez’s magic dust would have rubbed on Cole but the 31-year-old rolled back the years to turn on the pass supplied by Gerrard via the Uruguayan to score.
Luck was on the midfielder’s side as before the goal Rodgers had summoned Raheem Sterling to be his final substitute and Cole made way. But he was denied his moment of glory by Zverotic’s 88th-minute strike.
