Gerrad Wounded

Liverpool face an anxious wait to discover the extent of Steven Gerrard's hamstring injury.

Steven Gerrard trudges off at Goodison Park

The skipper was forced off after only 16 minutes of Liverpool's FA Cup defeat at Everton on Wednesday night after feeling a problem and the club will hope for a favourable diagnosis.

One of the reasons boss Rafael Benitez chose to sell Robbie Keane was Gerrard's ability to play behind Fernando Torres, who also looked jaded at Goodison Park.

To lose Gerrard for an extended spell, and in a worse case scenario he could be out for many weeks, would put a huge dent in their hopes of success in the Premier League as well as making progress against Real Madrid in the Champions League.

It is almost certain he will miss the weekend trip to Portsmouth and will not be involved with the England squad when they travel to Seville to play Spain on Wednesday.

Benitez said: "Steven Gerrard will have a scan [Thursday] to see the extent of the injury, we do not really know yet.

"Steven was tired, and he gets injured. He was tired, too, at Wigan but when I took him off there everyone was saying he had to play every single minute of every match. Now you have seen the consequences.

"He asked to be taken off, you could see at Wigan he was struggling and the same thing happened here.''

Benitez also made a sarcastic reference to the fact England made Gerrard travel to London to assess a previous injury before accepting he was injured earlier this season.

He continued: "Maybe he will have go down to London again like last time for a scan to prove he is injured. That would be funny.''