Liverpool FC Forum

by **jonnymac1979** » Wed Dec 08, 2004 3:52 pm

Just received this from my brother in an e-mail.
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This is a bit long but is a good read

By Steve Kelly Issue 65, Summer 2004

It's the height of futility - writing an article about a transfer that never even took place. Still, this fanzine has never shied away from the futile. In fact, we usually encourage it! I'm typing this long after the speculation ended and Steven Gerrard announced his decision to stay, so we can dispense with the "too lazy to dump an irrelevant piece" accusations right now. I found the whole fortnight fascinating, and seemed to belong to a very small minority who couldn't have cared less about the whole thing.

First of all, this needs to be carved in stone a mile high because some Reds seem to have forgotten it: no one player is bigger than Liverpool FC. Yes, he'd played very well last season and he is one of the rising stars in World Football. I'm glad he's one of ours BUT if the day comes when he no longer sees that as a privilege then he can do us all a favour and f**k right off. Perhaps that may be considered naïve, in a modern sport where the players hold sway but I don't really care. Having a debate about what will keep any individual at Anfield is a step too far, and this applies equally to Michael Owen.

Rather than look at the player and his motives (which we'll inevitably come to in a moment) I saw it more as a marker being lain down: this is where LFC find themselves in 2004. You may not like it, but there it is.

It was such a shame too, after everyone began to feel upbeat again once we'd appointed Benitez. It says a lot about your club when a successful manager can up sticks and say "I want to manage your team instead". I was more nervous during the fortnight between the Houllier 'resignation' (yes, indeedy do!) and the official appointment of Rafa, than I ever was during the will he/won't he saga that was played out for Gerrard in Portugal. It seemed that everyone was consumed by the feelgood factor. Valencia are a great club and they have an excellent side - one of the best we've played in recent years, arguably the best - but even now they can't compare to us. I think Liverpool have reached a stage similar to United during their 'lean' decades. Any ambitious manager knows that if he can succeed here the sky is the limit. Some cup success was all it took for hundreds of thousands to take to the streets and proclaim Gerard as the new Shankly.

Imagine how we will greet the next championship-winning manager? Then imagine the thousands of new fans swarming to the club. Imagine the 'tring' of cash registers (Uncle Rick does), and the renewed muscle that gives us in the Champions League. Such 'dreaming' will have entranced Benitez, and should he fail it will entrance other great managers.

So along comes Harry Harris and his Chelsea exclusives (are there any other kind?), and everyone else seemed to be totally deflated again. Not me: sure, it would be a problem to replace Stevie but there would be funds available to do just that - and a bit more besides. There was an awful lot wrong with our side last season, we needed maintenance in almost every part of the pitch. Even when you think of the best one-man teams in history (Argentina 1986?) there were still plenty of talented players to choose from and a strict team ethic to back up the genius. Benitez had to sort the whole thing out, and if Stevie (who's no Maradona) wanted out now that was his concern. At least we'd know where we stood. Not everyone was so blasé about the matter. In fact, it's fair to say that the various Internet forums were burning hot. I'd like to think that most if not all of the venom spat out was as a result of Gerrard's eventual destination.

Chelsea have never been liked, and I know the feeling is mutual. Of all the Cockney sides, I have the least affinity to that lot. Maybe if Millwall ever came up I'd feel differently, but Chelsea represent everything I despise about London. Add the sinister Abramovich and parasitic slimy journalists who think the sun shines out of their ar$e$, and the grisly picture is complete. Well, almost complete - because now they're a threat. It's all very well talking about the withdrawal of the roubles and 'the next Leeds', but for now there is real power at Stamford Bridge. That's only going to make them even more detestable - and losing Steven Gerrard to them would have been the final straw for many.

From the end of the season, Stevie was muttering darkly about us needing "three world class players". I assume he meant in addition to himself (and Michael if he was being generous). What his Euro 2004 performances did for that supposition is another matter, but once the Chelsea speculation went into overdrive (with not one word of denial from the player himself) I honestly couldn't have cared less. In fact, it was hard to suppress a guffaw or two when his dreadful back pass cost England a vital point. But it was now widely assumed that Gerrard was leaving, and words like 'traitor' were sweeping the forums. He was hiding behind England duty, one word to Chris Bascombe could have put fans at ease about next season - but he was saying nowt. That settled it in many minds. He'd already gone: all that remained was to settle a fee and give it to Benitez for the rebuilding that was already necessary. As there was talk about "betrayal" and even hope amongst the sick few that a leg or two would be broken, I was finding it hard to believe that it was coming to this. Liverpool play Chelsea in January, and the fixture was already being earmarked as a day to make Gerrard shudder. Anyone who managed to plough through 'Fuel My Fire' (issue 64) will know that I'm ambivalent about that sort of thing.

Against a class side like Chelsea, we'd need every little advantage going - and if Steven's presence was going to whip up a veritable sh!tstorm for the common good, so be it. But in all honesty I never felt 100% happy about that. We pride ourselves on welcoming back former players. True, one or two don't get quite the ovation they should and the underachievers tend to be smothered by a silent disinterest, but most get a marvellous reception. How many games did Paul Jones play for us again? When he came back with Wolves, I thought Ray Clemence had come out of retirement! So Steven Gerrard would not be coming back to a welcome of any kind. Judging from the Internet - which isn't always a clever thing to do - he was going to get it big time. That made me very uneasy, for two reasons. No matter how bad things get, we should always be above that cr@p. I can't begin to measure my contempt for the fans of other clubs who regard a player who leaves for another (usually better-placed) club as a "traitor". You can guess that the word 'Everton' is going to crop up at some stage here, and you'd be absolutely right. What Barmby was subjected to was nothing short of disgraceful. Hell, he couldn't even turn up at Goodison again (unless you believed that injury rubbish). Plantpots standing there with pictures of Nicky and 'Judas' written underneath, screaming "die die Nicky Nicky die" every chance they got. Absolutely pathetic, and he wasn't the first.

Numerous players returned to the Pit with other clubs, and no matter how well they'd played for Everton, no matter how reluctantly they'd left, they took sh!t for it. But we're better than that. Well, aren't we? From what I was seeing and hearing over the Gerrard business, it wasn't that we were better than the Blooz so much as we never really had to deal with those kind of situations before. When we were in the same boat, it seemed like we were going to boo, heckle and threaten with the best of 'em. I couldn't help feeling about another Steve that left us for a more successful club, and how different it all was then. McManaman played us all for mugs. He strung us along, until eventually any chance of a new contract had gone. I'm not saying he pulled up in the final straight, but I would say there was a decisive lack of commitment in that final season.

It was our own (i.e. Evans') fault for our dependency on Macca but that didn't excuse the final feeble few months. He cost us about £10m of transfer money, and his disinterest contributed to a paltry seventh place that would cost us more millions in European money. He walked out on a new manager just when he needed him most (ring any bells?), and the club ended up selling 9% to Granada immediately afterwards. Result? Not a peep, not a boo. There were a few heckles at the City game in February, but most frowned upon it and instead chose to ignore him. He'd been a terrific Liverpool servant for most of his time here, and if it had ended badly then what of it? We were above that kind of $h1te, leave that to the Evertonians - that is, until Steven Gerrard came back to Anfield in a Chelsea strip. This was the same Gerrard who had won four cups, had run miles and miles in the Liverpool cause, had signed a new contract that now gave Liverpool a stronger bargaining position with his future employees.

The same Gerrard who had CARRIED the team for nigh-on four months, dragging Houllier's bloated near-carcass of a team to fourth place, where the club could give Rafa a good head start and even more millions thanks to the Champions League. HE was going to get ripped apart. Where's the fairness? It wasn't just McManaman. Numerous players have taken the pi$$ out of this club since our last championship, and none of them have been tormented. Ince got a bit, but it was feeble and if you make a pact with the Mancs (and the Sun, never forget) you're hardly going to be on our Christmas card list are you? But Stevie G was to be hit hardest? Not even a sound for Phil Babb, that ludicrous waste of transfer fee, obscene wages and space - who sat in the reserves and picked up his cash for doing FA. Timewasters like Cheyrou and Diouf could come back, and they will be cheered. Watch what happens when that spineless, malingering momma's boy comes back with Birmingham (Birmingham, I ask you!) - we'll raise the roof, and he'll no doubt play a blinder. It just didn't seem right. Of course, some were arguing that McManaman went abroad. He wasn't a direct threat to Liverpool. That we didn't hate Real anything like as much as Chelsea, and that the symbolism of the move (and the timing) were crucial, damaging. They have a point, a good one. Who have Chelsea snaffled, apart from the manager, that anyone of any significance wanted? Gerrard would have been the first. The Liverpool captain, widely regarded as the next Roy Keane (even by the manager of the previous Roy Keane), a player so good that only the miraculous grace of Thierry Henry eclipsed him last season. Liverpool fans objected to the nouveau riche of Stamford Bridge.

Even in this decade, they have not done as well as us. How could Steve betray us like this? I've written in the last few issues about Liverpool fans having to accept that we are no longer the glory boys, a club with a great past can no longer snap its fingers and simply assume a player has no alternative but to stay here. Rome was TWENTY YEARS AGO. It's been 14 years since we last clutched transistor radios to our ears and checked up on our (struggling) title rivals. Anyway, it's all gone digital now! It was, in short, time to look at it from the player's point of view.

Gerrard made his debut in 1998, for Houllier in his first year here. He had to wait four years for a genuine title challenge, and a similar length of time for a run in the Champions League. To date, they were our only realistic chances to win either competition. He was reading stuff in the papers that Benitez was as defensive in his outlook as Houllier. He had been through one period of transition, and now here we were on the verge of another one. Even experts like Alan Hansen wrote (incorrectly) about the 5-6 years it will take Rafa to get us back in the game. And along come Chelsea. We're buying all of these players, says Frank. We're getting paid shedloads, says John. You'll be the final piece in our jigsaw, says Peter. Time for bed, said Zebedee.........well, you get the drift. Add Jesus Mourinho himself and there is only one obvious conclusion to make.

Or so Stevie was beginning to think. A lot of the animosity from Liverpool fans was sparked by this realisation: after years of scooping up other clubs' cream and laughing at the hyperventilated outrage that followed, we were about to become the victims for a change - and boy, did we not like that! All of those years treating the likes of Boro like a farm club (Souness, Johnston, Hodgson, Ziege), sneering at the Forest fans and cheering wildly when Stan turned in match-winning displays against them. Laughing at the Geordies for calling Hamann greedy - yes, and when was the last time you won anything? Mercilessly mocking Leeds for their inept business methods, revelling in the purchase of Kewell for a ludicrously low fee. The boot was on the other foot, and it's a horrible feeling. I know they're easy to mock, and there are times when unquestioning loyalty to the Liverpool cause is not only endearing but absolutely necessary, but there's a bunch that I call The Linda Blair Reds. Like the unfortunate lass in The Exorcist, their heads spin every which way with bile indiscriminately shooting out in all directions.
"Those b@$t@rd$ at Middlesbrough, suing us over Ziege! Of course he'd prefer to play for us! That Gibson is just covering up his own incompetence. Grow up, Boro". "Blues? Don't you just hate them? Nicky's going nowhere with you lot, that's why he wants to play for a real club with real ambition, not you losers". "Fowler is God!" "F**k off, Fowler! You've done nothing for 5 years". "Gerrard, you Judas! It's just about the money, what have Chelsea ever done?" "Well in, Stevie lad! It just goes to show, you can't buy loyalty, no wonder his head was turned with all that tapping up going on" "What are Valencia crying about? Tell them to stick their 'compensation' up their gigantic Spanish ar$e$" etc etc. Phew. And then there's the rest of us, who don't happen to believe that our club is always right, what goes around comes around - and that we were in serious danger of losing a game that we helped invent. I could not believe the references to treachery and "buying success". Isn't that what we've been trying to do for over a decade now? Chelsea have merely moved on to the next logical step. Did nobody think this was ever going to happen?

Liverpool did not create the idea of a breakaway 'Premier' League, but our consent finally gave it the green light. Of course there should be limits, on wages and spending, but we never stopped to think about creating any at the time because it was automatically assumed we would always be among the major players. A year before, Souness made his customary Grand Entrance by spending FIVE MILLION POUNDS on two relegated players! We still are part of the so-called elite, but symbolically Gerrard wearing a Chelsea shirt would have said otherwise to many neutrals. Ironically, the speculation was undoing all the good work and wiping out the feelgood factor created by Rafa's swift departure from Valencia. The Spanish club were miffed to put it lightly, and probably slightly baffled, but no one with a deep red heart gave a damn about that. If he had gone, it would have made one small difference to my viewpoint. All the pundits were urging him to go. I gave up on Mark Lawrenson a long time ago, but even Jocky didn't see why tradition and the 'possibility' of Benitez turning it round should keep Gerrard from his 'dream move' and his 'destiny' (pass the sick bag). There was a growing consensus that we were on the periphery. I find that finishing 30 points behind the champions tends to make people slightly dismissive about your chances of future success. Well, let them - and if Stevie wanted to be part of that group, let him too. We had one mission, and that was to prove all the doubters wrong. If Gerrard himself was one of the gang, that was beyond our control. We couldn't even claim it was all far-fetched. After one year of Russian uber-wealth, Chelsea had competed meaningfully for the championship and the Champions League. They had just persuaded the manager who had emulated Bob Paisley (UEFA Cup followed by the European Cup) to join them, and were about to add the best midfield player in the league, or at least the one with the brightest future. Only an idiot would claim that Chelsea wouldn't stand a chance of ending a 50-year wait for the title. In contrast, he'd run his bo!!0cks off for us - and for what? To trundle into a lame fourth place, further behind the champions than any Liverpool team since Shankly and 1962 - and that was only because we were in a lower division! So it was a bit rich (boom boom) for some Reds to keep bringing the debate back to the money. Visions of the Kop singing "one greedy b@$t@rd" entered my head - and this was all to be directed at just one player, right? Don't make me laugh. And all the while, the striker entering the final year of his contract who had used one stalling tactic after another was getting off way too lightly. "Oh, I can't discuss my new contract, my agent's on a 6 month sabbatical" "Really? I thought you were signed to an agency" "Yes, but he deals with all my contract stuff - we'll talk when he gets back"......... "Well, he's back, can we talk now?" "Listen, this is all very complicated and we still haven't clinched 4th place yet have we? Can we wait till the end of the season?"........." "No, don't bother me now, I've got to concentrate on England and Euro 2004"........."Oh give me a break will ya? Let me have a breather after Portugal?"... ...... "Let me concentrate on pre-season training".........and then it'll be the CL qualifier. Before you know it, we're in the final year of the contract and all the major clubs have sorted their squads out. Even if we wanted to sell Michael, we couldn't.

Nice to have a smokescreen like Stevie G, eh? This will all sound paranoid and petty if/when he does sign up, but he must have known we'd be rattled after McManaman. Both players have flatly refused to consider the fans' feelings in all of this, and it reflects badly on them no matter how it all turns out. Things were looking bleak. What made things worse was Rooney's newfound national hero status. Everton were going to keep their true-blue homegrown genius, and we were going to sell ours. We were going to get it in the neck from blues who'd been waiting four years to rub it in about Barmby. Déjà vu. I'd written a piece then that spent half the time mocking Everton for their fake, club-manipulated outrage (the six worst words etc) but asking Reds to keep on their guard because if we didn't watch out that could be us in a few years' time. When Houllier started gathering cups in May, I forgot all about it and hoped everyone else would: the Jeremiah words of an eternal pessimist. Things change so quickly, don't they? ********* In the end, he stayed. You knew it had been touch and go. He didn't exactly look overjoyed at the press conference. I'll ignore the southern media cr@p about death threats - petty, mean jibes by deluded runts who could not understand why anyone would want to live in the north to begin with. What made him stay? I've absolutely no idea. Some fans had said to me that he should have given Rafa a year, THEN asked to leave. And that would have been alright? I hardly think so, and it definitely won't be now. Asking Benitez to solve all our problems in one season is utterly deluded, and if Stevie goes to Chelsea in 2005 it will simply be seen as something he'd always wanted to do. In fact, we'd have spent a year in transition building around him, only to have that season wasted by his departure anyway. I'm not so sure the reaction won't be worse than if he'd gone this summer. The rebuilding we could have done with the £30m fee will not now take place. In a strange way, I was disappointed he was staying. Of course, that's just me with my downer head on again. We're keeping one of the game's great talents, and if Rafa can get the rest to put in the same effort we should do a lot better next season. I still feel a lot of fans have lost a bit of faith and trust in Steven and Michael.

Maybe it is "just a job", after all?

by **jonnymac1979** » Wed Dec 08, 2004 3:53 pm

Remember, I'm just the messenger.

Too good not to post though.

by **mistyred** » Wed Dec 08, 2004 5:08 pm

Good post

.

by **murphy0151** » Wed Dec 08, 2004 5:19 pm

fukn ell matey if i want to read a book ill go the library.

by **Gareth G** » Wed Dec 08, 2004 5:25 pm

If the took you 10 minutes to read then you superhuman pr something!

It took me about 20 minutes readig that, but in the end it was worth it, good post.

by **jonnymac1979** » Wed Dec 08, 2004 5:34 pm

KOP-1892 wrote:If the took you 10 minutes to read then you superhuman pr something!

It took me about 20 minutes readig that, but in the end it was worth it, good post.

Yeah, 10 minutes.

by **taff** » Wed Dec 08, 2004 5:48 pm

Excellent post and good spot Jonnymac

Might not agree with it all but personally it aint that far off the mark for me

by **murphy0151** » Wed Dec 08, 2004 6:05 pm

johnny 5 init lid

by **Gareth G** » Wed Dec 08, 2004 6:35 pm

IT takes me f*cking 10 minutes to scroll the screen let alone read it lol!

by **supersub** » Wed Dec 08, 2004 7:01 pm

on the button..big game tonight..bye

by **Ciggy** » Wed Dec 08, 2004 7:26 pm

Good post JMc
Theres something in there which is quite shocking really about the shoe being on the other foot, and the cream of the crop came to LFC and left poorer clubs, its so true now first Owen now Stevie it feels f@ckin awful but I suppose the truth hurts and most of us wear rose tinted glasses as not to admit the truth.
But I suppose that comes from winning everything insight years ago for years on end.

by **jonnymac1979** » Wed Dec 08, 2004 7:32 pm

It makes you think doesn't it?

Should Rafa maybe start thinking about building a team which doesn't include Steven Gerrard?

I've got enough faith in him to do it if Gerrard decides to leave. As amazing a player that Gerrard is, no player is bigger than the club.

by **Gareth G** » Wed Dec 08, 2004 7:46 pm

Its possible Benitez has thought about this long and hard already. From the time he was nearly off i bet Rafa thought its time to think of a team without Steven as he could now be considered a liability (not in terms talent obviously). As much as i would hate to see him off, hes not irreplacable and theres better out there...if you look in the right places!

Anyway, i hope he stays, but if he doesnt then so be it. Alonso is quite capable of filling his boots.

by **Ciggy** » Wed Dec 08, 2004 7:50 pm

Alonsos a fantastic player but blows hot and cold and is known for it, mind you ive seen alot of players blowing hot and cold for us over the last few years :kungfu:

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