Liverpool manager Rafa Benitez defended his decision not to introduce Peter Crouch earlier against Besiktas in their 1-2 Champions League loss in Istanbul Wednesday night.

Crouch was standing on the sidelines ready to come on with 10 minutes left when Bobo put Besiktas 2-0 up. Steven Gerrard managed to pull a goal back with five minutes to go, but despite a grandstand finish, Benitez’s side was unable to salvage a point.

The England international caused plenty of havoc in Besiktas’ penalty area once on the pitch and left supporters and neutrals querying Benitez’s decision not to bring him on sooner with Liverpool chasing the game.

The defeat leaves Liverpool rooted to the foot of group A and facing an early exit from the competition. They must now win their final three group games to stand a chance of qualifying for the knockout stages. Benitez said: “We needed to make a change, but the players were doing well. Dirk Kuyt and Andriy Voronin were creating chances, I was happy with the way they were playing.

“It was just bad luck that Crouch was waiting to come on when they scored their second.”

Benitez was not too despondent by the defeat and felt that it was not their attacking play that let them down in Istanbul. He also said that Liverpool were capable of qualifying from their group despite only picking up one point.

“We were attacking so much it was hard to defend against the counter-attack. In the end we had 28 attempts on goal, it was not the creating of chances that was the problem, it was putting those chances away,” he said.

“It was down as much to bad luck as anything else. But if we keep playing like we did here, we will win matches because we will certainly score more next time around if we play like that.”

Liverpool will get the chance to avenge the defeat when they host Besiktas at Anfield on November 6. They then face Porto at home on November 28 before finishing their campaign with a visit to group leaders Marseille on December 11.

“Obviously it is very difficult now for us to get through, but I believe we still can. There are three games left and we must win all three, but we can do that,” Benitez said.

“We have to wait to see now what we must do, how the numbers add up. The fact that Porto drew with Marseille in the other group game was a help for us, it certainly improves our options.”