NEVER discount Stoke City. Just when it seemed safe to assume their monochrome approach had been rumbled, they not only held Liverpool to a draw, thus preventing the league leaders from scoring against them in 180 minutes this season, but with a little more good fortune and a little less prodigal finishing Stoke might have taken all three points.

In contrast, Liverpool were desperately disappointing. They found long-throw expert Rory Delap — whose chief asset has not been wholly uncommented upon this season — a man of mystery; they were outfought and outpassed in midfield and, on this occasion at least, lacked the vim and the aura of champions.

The evening could scarcely have looked less promising for the plummeting hosts, still reeling from internal but very public fisticuffs and defeat at Hartlepool United and they have still won just once in 10 Premier League encounters.

Even history was against them. City had not beaten Liverpool since 1984 and, when Liverpool last rolled into the Britainnia, they waltzed back up the M6 having won 8-0, although Potteries diehards still maintain the result would have been different had not Peter Thorne spurned a most pottable chance at 0-0.

Liverpool manager Rafael Benitez, before baiting Sir Alex Ferguson (“I don’t regret it,” he said last night, “he was talking too much about Liverpool and that has to stop. He’s a little bit scared”), spent much of last week training specifically for Delap’s lobbed grenades. If the subtle Xabi Alonso — not necessarily the midfielder of choice on a murky sub-zero Stoke evening — was indisposed, the combative Martin Skrtel made his first start since October; Sami Hyypia added yet more muscle to an already strapping rearguard, while such was Benitez’s ultimately misplaced confidence in his unusual formation that Robbie Keane and Fernando Torres were merely on the bench.

In theory, Benitez hardly seemed in expansive mood, fielding the not always prolific Dirk Kuyt as a lone striker, Steven Gerrard just behind him and — as Argentina manager Diego Maradona watched — Javier Mascherano as a chaperone for the green-shirted Liverpool defence. This should have meant Albert Riera and Yossi Benayoun dragging Stoke’s bunched defence wide and when Kuyt headed Riera’s 10th-minute cross over, nature seemed destined to take its course.

Yet, with the Britannia bearpit at its most fervid, the freeze contributing its traditional leveller role, Liverpool never got to grips with their roles. For a moment you felt an upset might be possible, even after Salif Diao pulled a muscle in the warm-up. And so it almost proved. “We got a performance,“ purred assistant manager Dave Kemp. “We don’t want to be greedy, but this was two points dropped.“

Delap might not be throwing quite the distance he was before his recent shoulder injury and his throws have not brought a goal since Arsenal crumbled on November 1 but his weapon remains potent. His first one caused a commotion in the away defence and they cleared only as far as Amdy Faye, who hooked the ball into the area, where the undoubtedly unmarked and very possibly offside Delap himself had time and space to crash his shot against the underside of the crossbar.

Although Kuyt missed another opportunity six yards out when Thomas Sorensen made himself big to block the Dutchman’s low shot, Stoke were brimming with self-belief, especially when new signing Matthew Etherington switched to the left wing to torment Jamie Carragher, never the most comfortable of full-backs.

With lightweight Lucas Leiva a passenger in the centre of midfield, Gerrard marooned too far forward and Mascherano similarly disconnected too far back, Stoke were allowed to dictate the game’s tempo.

Torres had spent half-time warning up alone, but Benitez elected not to tinker. He almost paid the price five minutes after the break, when Jose Reina’s awful clearance fell to Dave Kitson on the edge of the penalty area. Bereft of confidence, Kitson — who, like his striking partner Richard Cresswell, has yet to score a Premier League goal this season — betrayed himself with a clumsy first touch before blasting wildly into the side-netting.

An hour in, Benitez yielded and introduced Torres. Liverpool looked more menacing but just as vulnerable and so frustrated was Gerrard that he got himself booked for taking a free kick too early.

For all their fanatical commitment Stoke did not run out of steam. Kitson was less culpable after 75 minutes when he ghosted through a terrified, ball-watching defence to head Delap’s throw inches over; Glenn Whelan curled a delicious free kick just over Reina’s bar and while Gerrard was twice unfortunate, first to see his crafty late free kick bounce off the bar; then when he and Ryan Shawcross combined to hit the post, he could hardly rail at the injustice of it all.

“We’re still top of the league,” mused Benitez. For him and his team that proved the evening’s only consolation.

STOKE CITY: Sorensen 7, Wilkinson 6, Abdoulaye Faye 6, Shawcross 6, Higginbotham 6, Delap 7, Amdy Faye 7, Whelan 6, Etherington 7 (Lawrence 78min), Cresswell 5, Kitson 5 (Pugh 89min)

LIVERPOOL: Reina 5, Carragher 5, Hyypia 6, Skrtel 5, Aurelio 6, Benayoun 5 (Babel 76min), Lucas 4, Mascherano 6, Riera 5 (Torres 60min, 6), Gerrard 6, Kuyt 6