THAT WAS THE WEEK DION FANNING PETER CROUCH is not a dubious goalscorer, but a scorer of dubious goals. If the frighteningly tall striker finds his wages are a little less than he imagined this year after missing out on a goal bonus or two, he should look to the Dubious Goals Committee which surely owes him something for raising awareness. No one man has done as much for a committee since Joe McCarthy put the House Un-American Activities Committee on the map and, if you want to stretch the joke, both excelled at missing the target. Before Crouch came along, the Dubious Goals Committee seemed to meet up once a year, now they are in almost permanent session, called upon to study his latest goal which they deliberate over for months until the next one comes along. Crouch's goals are now routinely referred to the panel, causing the player some anguish and leading him to refuse to talk to the Press Association earlier this season after they credited his header against Newcastle as a Shay Given o.g. Thankfully, that furore went away, helped by Crouch's mature and moderate stance not to score again until time had healed some of the wounds. He did so on Wednesday, joining in the goalscoring late on as Liverpool's forwards put their troubles behind them and most of them scored in the league for the first time this year. Crouch deflected a Steven Gerrard shot into the goal and the Liverpool captain clearly felt the big man's need was greater. Gerrard has his own problems. In a wide-ranging interview last week he discussed Liverpool transfer targets before, seemingly burdened by administrative issues, he set Thierry Henry up for Arsenal's winner last weekend at Highbury. But Gerrard gave Crouch the glory against Fulham, understanding that the strange strikeforce currently employed at Anfield needs all the help it can get. When Rafael Benitez added Crouch to the roster, he appeared to be acquiring a Felliniesque cast to score his goals. There was an air of the surreal as he brought in the freakishly lanky Peter Crouch to work alongside the impossibly handsome Fernando Morientes and the, well, exceedingly stupid Djibril Cisse. This was not helped by the occasional selection of the fantastically tiny Florent Sinama Pongolle. Since then, things have got worse with the recruitment of the irrepressibly irrepressible Robbie Fowler. Meet these men at a bar and you would think you were in for a very strange night and certainly, for large portions of the season, there has been no suggestion that playing football is what they are good at. IT certainly doesn't appear to be the forte of the devastatingly quick Cisse, who is still waiting to commemorate the birth of his son by unveiling a t-shirt he has made for the occasion (if he doesn't score soon the child may have resentment issues). Cisse failed to score when introduced on Wednesday, the only striker not to end the curse, and it is no surprise given his failure to comprehend some of the basics of forward play. Cisse scored for fun, as they say, in France, but they must not play offside over there because he seems to have acquired no knowledge of that rule during his years of goalscoring before Gerard Houllier bought him for a staggering £14m. The elements of offside Cisse fails to understand are usually explained to strikers at the age of 16 and Benitez reportedly walked away dejected after a two-hour session earlier in the season appeared to make no difference to his comprehension of the law. In fact, the offside rule should probably be amended further with Cisse in mind. There is some confusion still over the new interpretation involving active and inactive players. When Liverpool play, things could be made a little clearer for officials. The hoary old comment that if you're not interfering with play, you shouldn't be on the pitch could have been uttered with Cisse in mind. What is he doing there? Consequently, he should be judged not to be interfering with play unless he puts the ball in the net. Even if Cisse is 20 yards offside and the ball lands at his feet, the linesman should keep his flag down and see how the "phase" develops. In all probability the ball will end up behind the goal, high in the stand, and no advantage will have accrued to the attacking side. It certainly will bring more life to these games and take away the frustration of the late flag. Instead we will have the entertainment of watching Cisse trying to score. In the unlikely event that he does, there will be great tension as the crowd turns to the linesman wondering if the flag will be raised. Soon there will be an air of pantomime to the whole thing, perhaps a bit of banter between the linesman and Cisse. Football needs entertainers and, for 14 million quid, Liverpool are, at least, entitled to that.