Houllier keeps faith with Owen despite shortage of goals

The in-flight movie on Liverpool's return from a 2-0 defeat to Valencia in their opening Champions' League fixture was The Others, a psychological thriller full of ghostly intrigue. Appropriately dark viewing, some might argue, given that Michael Owen had continued to resemble a shadow of his former self in the Mestalla stadium.

The others – his Anfield colleagues, that is – were also a pale imitation of the team that reached the quarter-finals last season. Yet it was the talismanic striker's impact, or rather the lack of it, that will particularly concern supporters of both Liverpool and England after Owen's appearance as a second-half substitute made it 10 games with only one goal from open play.

A delicate balancing act on the part of the Liverpool manager, Gérard Houllier, is required if Owen is to re-assert his status as the Premiership's most clinical and prolific finisher. The Frenchman's decision to rest him at Bolton last Saturday and to start him on the bench in Spain shows he is carefully weighing his team's short-term needs against the long-term well-being of a player who, at 22, has arguably been overplayed during his five-year career.

Owen returned from his second World Cup carrying an injury which hindered his participation in Liverpool's pre-season programme. He has been playing catch-up ever since, affecting his performances to the extent that Houllier conceded yesterday that he lacked the "split second of sharpness" – as well as the luck – that could have made him the League's leading marksman.

"When Michael does score I think he'll get goals galore," he said, pledging to "back him 100 per cent". Houllier was clearly trying to ease the mental pressure on a player he described as "obsessed" with scoring when he added: "I'll be delighted if he is not our top scorer and we are successful." In the meantime, Owen has a new, personalised training regime, aimed at making him stronger without reducing his speed.

Liverpool were outclassed by the Pablo Aimar-inspired Spanish champions, their cause damaged by Stéphane Henchoz's absence and lost long before Dietmar Hamann's dismissal. "You don't sleep a lot after a match like that," Houllier confessed, going on to observe that next week's Group B visit by Basle, Celtic's Swiss conquerors, had already become a must-win affair. "It could be like a final," he said.

All the more reason for his team selection to be right. Houllier insisted he had "no regrets" about his Owen-free starting line-up at Valencia, despite the fact that he withdrew both his Senegalese signings at half-time and his surprising assertion yesterday that the game may have been "too big" for El Hadji Diouf, a World Cup quarter-finalist and African player of the year.

"We didn't have the fluency or width we've had in some games, and our ball-retention wasn't good," said Houllier. "But Europe is always a fight. Tactically, you've got to be extremely disciplined. Practically our whole midfield was beaten by the run [from Ruben Baraja] for the second goal. I can't remember a Liverpool so weak in the challenge."