Issue 73, Summer 2006
By Steve Kelly
Before Frasier was Frasier in ‘Frasier’, he was Frasier in ‘Cheers’. In one episode he was going to an interview to see if he was a suitable parent to have his child at an exclusive nursery. One of the bar proles says “you’re spending all that money and YOU have to be interviewed by THEM?” Frasier’s reply was “well, an institution like this has an obligation to weed out the useless lowlifes – I just pray to God I’m not one of them”………that’s pretty much how I feel about Liverpool, G14, the Champions League and the Premiership’s ‘Big 4’.
Anyone with a genuine love of sport or competition in general must really loathe what’s happened to the beautiful game (sick). I’m writing with the Charity Shield just days away. For ten years, only 4 clubs have ever participated in it. It’s our third in a decade, and we only played Arsenal because we were runners up and they’d won the double. But for the Treble and Istanbul our place in such ‘illustrious’ company would be questioned further still.
It’s dog eat dog nowadays and if we have any say in the matter I’d much rather Liverpool FC eat than be eaten. We have had a fine decade up to know. Maybe a lot of the actual football wasn’t all it could have been but for sheer drama it’ll take some beating. Fiscal matters often dominate conversations with fellow Reds, and this was the case way before Chelsea came along. I was probably one of the bitterest people when it looked like Gerrard was away and I’ve turned 180 degrees on Michael Owen, but any event (even of a symbolic nature) that decrees Liverpool are a club you leave in order to get to the top tends to bring out the worst in many of us.
Power and money are the new Gods, and it’s difficult to see how this situation could ever be reversed. We’re all going to have to make decisions about whether we want to be associated with a club that wants to win ANY way it can. As much as it may seem like Parry, Moores and co. would like to do ‘the right thing’ they will probably end up going the same way as United, Chelsea and Arsenal. I’d guess that view isn’t merely confined to the cynical element amongst us; the differences there are between fans can only probably be measured in the degree of unease we feel (if it’s felt at all).
I wrote an article condemning the ground move in 2000! With an escalating feeling of dread you sense the word ‘groundshare’ is now playing on the minds that matter. Naming rights and various other mini-betrayals will come and go, but the one the fans (of both sides in fairness) would genuinely balk at still hovers over us. The local press have been quite disgraceful over this, but six years down the line we still haven’t started building. Numerous names have been linked to investment but there still isn’t any. It was widely assumed that Rafa won the mind games in March and had been guaranteed at least 30m to strengthen the squad. We still haven’t crossed the deadline yet but who would genuinely be surprised if Bellamy and Pennant turned out to be it? And if he does get more money, does Kuyt actually seem worth the risk? Damned if you do………
There are troubling times ahead on the field too. We’ve reached the stage where Evans and Houllier previously caved in. This is the third time in a decade where we’ve grabbed the coat tails of the leaders with the tips of our fingers, and on two occasions that final 5% or so of improvement remained tantalisingly elusive. One look at the first 15 league fixtures may rein in any optimism about a title challenge. People keep throwing that ‘it took Fergie 7 years’ rubbish at us, but we may have to show yet more patience. We allowed Rafa’s predecessors two years of deterioration before they were jettisoned. That now looks fair enough. I don’t envy Parry or Moores the decisions they may have to face. Rafa looks like being the right man but if we can’t get him the right players it’ll all be for nothing.
This must sound like the normal pessimism, a reverse jinx that occasionally works (the road to Istanbul was littered with wildly inaccurate predictions!) but I just don’t see how we got 82 points last year. It didn’t seem like that kind of team. We certainly need somebody other than Gerrard to step up to the plate. Chelsea have a quality eleven and a pretty good second 11, so that could be the way Benitez wants to go too. Then you see Salif Diao toddle onto the pitch against Mainz and you begin to wonder. I actually think we’ll do okay this season, although I rather foolishly predicted we’d win the league to the newspaper I write for in Ireland. Call it drunken bravado if you will. We lost the next 3 friendlies after I’d opened my big gob, so I’m desperately trying to undo that hoodoo!
On a personal note can I just give you a heads up about TTW&R’s future i.e. it doesn’t have one. I’m really not looking forward to carrying on, so I’ve put an absolute time limit on how long we’ve got to go. Two seasons maximum. If I get myself sorted out in terms of future employment we may pull up earlier. I’m 47, and while age hasn’t stopped the likes of our own John Pearman or Dave Wallace at Man City it’s not for me. Standing on the streets of L4 in all weathers has taken its toll and it’s having an impact on the fanzine itself. I don’t think that back page is funny at all, and it’s also hypocritical given my views on Crouch’s treatment by the press, but I struggled badly to think of anything else. That’s becoming the norm rather than the exception.
I still love writing about the Reds so I suppose a book might be a solution. The market does seem to be flooded, albeit with typical Liverpudlian excellence. I just know I don’t want to do this any more. Sadly, a lot fewer people will be upset about it than in 1996 when I first ‘threatened’ to quit. The team went on an extraordinary run of results after that, and when I came back they totally imploded. Our last title win was in the year I started the fanzine. Hmmmmmm...
|
