SUNDERLAND aren't bad enough to be relegated and - on this form - Liverpool aren't good enough to win the Championship.

That seems a pretty fair assessment after a hard-fought game in front of a record 48,355 crowd at the Stadium as Liverpool climbed into second place in the Premiership after an eighth consecutive League win.

And while Liverpool extended their unbeaten League run on Wearside to 20 games they had to thank England striker Michael Owen for a moment of sheer genius and a huge helping of good luck not to have shared the spoils.

Sunderland certainly deserved something from a game in which they showed their usual fighting spirit and Liverpool rarely showed the cut-and-thrust football which has put them in the title race alongside Arsenal and Manchester United.

Certainly Liverpool never produced the silky skills demonstrated by their Championship rivals in recent decisive victories over Sunderland - but they have the ability to nick results when they need to.

A midweek quarter-final Champions League defeat against Bayer Leverkusen seemed to leave the Merseysiders with a hangover and it was left to Owen to make up for a catalogue of misses in Germany with a match-winning goal to keep Liverpool's title challenge on course.

The 22-year-old striker had been well marshalled by the home defence until the 55th minute when he pounced on a perfectly weighted pass from the right from England team-mate Steven Gerrard to hook his first-time right-foot shot over the head of goalkeeper Thomas Sorensen - stranded on the edge of the six-yard box - into the net.

"You are always wary of giving Liverpool even half a chance," said Sunderland manager Peter Reid afterwards. "The chance Owen stuck away was a perfect finish.

"When you are playing against players of that quality you can never relax at all. That goal just showed that if you give them half a chance the ball is in the back of the net.

"As soon as Michael Owen hit it I said 'goal'."

But Reid had also reacted the same way five minutes earlier when he thought that his veteran striker Niall Quinn had broken the deadlock with a header from an unmarked position 15 yards out which sailed over the bar.

Reid had impressed on his players the need to be efficient in front of goals and take advantage of whatever chances came their way.

He observed: "I think Niall might have been disappointed that he didn't get his header on target - the cross Kevin Kilbane put in was the best ball of the game."

After a very poor first half when only the occasion flash of ingenuity from Norwegian international John Arne Riise entertained the big crowd, Sunderland seemed to step up a gear.

Kilbane, often a target for derision by the home fans, had taken advantage of some indecisive play by right back Abel Xavier, had central defenders Sami Hyypia and Stephan Henchox working overtime in the air, and Quinn's miss was to prove costly as the crowd sensed a goal.

Unfortunately for Sunderland it came at the wrong end, with Owen delighting the Liverpool supporters with a clinical finish.

But the goal did not give the Reds much breathing space - and Quinn almost made up for his miss with a tremendous right-foot shot from 22 yards, which brought an inspired one-handed save from goalkeeper Jerzy Dudek.

Kilbane kept up the pressure on the left, and both Gerrard and Xavier were booked for fouls on the much more confident-looking Republic of Ireland international.

The game was still in the balance, but it might well have been all over in the 72nd minute when the controversial former Arsenal, Real Madrid and Paris St Germain striker Nicolas Anelka produced brreath-taking footwork to take the ball past Joachim Bjorklund and Darren Williams before beating Sorensen with an angled left-foot shot which came back off the inside of the post.

The escape seemed to make Sunderland even more determined to get an equaliser, and Kevin Phillips went agonisingly close in the 77th minute when he turned on the edge of the box to unleash a curling right-foot shot which brought a great save from Dudek.

And to add to Sunderland's woes - and virtually end their hopes of snatching a last-gasp equaliser - they had United States international Claudio Reyna sent off when a high challenge on Owen earned him a second yellow card.

Sunderland, with three games to play, may well be safe with their current 38 points as the teams below them continue to struggle, but Reid wants his men to make sure off their own bat.

He said: "We have a couple of difficult away games against West Ham and Charlton Athletic coming up and we need to get points. "I don't hold the view that we are already safe - I think we need to win at least one game."

The late dismissal of Reyna will keep the American midfielder out of the following week's game at Charlton.

Reid said: "I have seen worse tackles in Europe all week and I think a little common sense should have prevailed."

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