Crystal Palace heaped more misery on a mentally frail Liverpool when they came from behind to win 3-1 in the Premier League on Sunday, six months after effectively ending the northern club’s title hopes when they drew 3-3.
Liverpool finished second last season but, like Tottenham Hotspur who came back to win 2-1 at Hull City late on, they have started this term poorly and are looking to climb out of mid-table and back up the standings.
While Spurs moved from 12th to 10th, Liverpool dropped a place to 12th after again losing at Palace, where their hopes of winning the title were so spectacularly dashed last May when they let slip a 3-0 lead as Palace fought back to level.
This time they wasted a lead they took in the second minute when Rickie Lambert scored his first goal for the club following his move from Southampton in the close season.
Instead of building on it, they crashed to a third successive league defeat as Palace ended a run of five league games without a win.
Goals from Dwight Gayle after 17 minutes, then Joe Ledley and a superb curling free kick from skipper Mile Jedinak in the last 12 minutes, gave Palace the points which lifted them out of the bottom three and up to 15th on 12 points -- two behind Liverpool.
If Palace gave a Neil Warnock-like performance then Spurs gave a typical Spurs performance, especially in the first half when they flattered to deceive and Hull looked the better side.
But Spurs ended the happier despite having to wait until the 90th minute for Christian Eriksen’s winner against the home side, who had three former Spurs players -- Michael Dawson, Tom Huddlestone and Jake Livermore -- in their starting lineup.
Inevitably, it was one of them who scored against his old club with Livermore cracking home from outside the box after eight minutes.
