For me this guy is always fair but what do you think?
MOMENTUM BUILDING FOR HOULLIER AXE
By Frank Malley, PA Chief Sports Writer
The wrecking ball is picking up momentum at Anfield.
First the bigots filled the phone-in airwaves with the sort of spiteful venom which manager Gerard Houllier never deserved.
Now dark murmurings, supposedly from the Anfield dressing room, question the wisdom of Liverpool being led into the Champions League next season by Houllier, while Celtic's Martin O'Neill is openly touted as the man to take over.
The Liverpool Board are said to be contemplating sacking a manager for the first time since 1956.
It would be a desperate way to fall but increasingly it looks to be the fate of a man who has accused Liverpool supporters of "living in the past."
On that score he's right.
Gone are the days when Liverpool could win the championship using just 14 players.
Gone are the days when they could dominate at home and in Europe with a side packed with home-grown stars, when Bill Shankly mused about building a side that was "invincible, so they'll have to send a side from Mars to beat us."
Football has moved on. It's about managers like Arsene Wenger, with a shrewd businesslike brain, a sharp eye for talent and a flair for a bargain.
And sadly it is about the likes of Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich and Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra - men whose entire knowledge of the game could be printed on the back of a five pound note with a thick paintbrush. Billionaires whose allegiance is as interchangeable as their underpants.
If Liverpool chairman David Moores understandably viewed the £73million package recently put forward by Liverpool businessman Steve Morgan, his biggest critic, with suspicion, then he should have run a mile and then sprinted some more when propositioned by a £60million Thai bid that is still on the table and could smear the Liverpool brand.
But one thing has not changed about football. Supporters, especially at a club with a heritage as illustrious as Liverpool's, need hope in their hearts - and on Merseyside right now hope is little more than a street which connects the city's two cathedrals.
That is why Houllier's job is on the line.
Apart from the sourest, most people accept and acclaim Houllier's successes. They recognise the restoration of discipline following the Fowler-McManaman 'Spice Boys' Anfield era and approve of the magnificence of the youth academy built under Houllier's guidance, an achievement which would make the Liverpool boss a front-runner for the FA's post of technical director should he leave the club.
They accept, too, that he won five trophies in one calendar year three years ago, including the FA Cup and UEFA Cup.
But, six years into a five-year plan, they see a team which, although it scraped into the Champions League qualifying spot, finished 30 points behind champions Arsenal in this season's Premiership.
For a club that has won a record 18 league titles and was the hallmark of excellence for so long the width of that gulf is difficult to accept.
Houllier understands football, he carries a passion for Liverpool - but there is no getting away from the fact that his big buys have been big failures.
Is it any wonder the Board, who have handed him £104m to date, now seem less reluctant to publicly support him with the likes of Diao, Diouf, Biscan and Cheyrou still walking the corridors of Anfield?
What if another £50million went the way of the last? Houllier stubbornly defends his corner, answering such questions with a Gallic bristle. But the momentum gathers.
Steven Gerrard and Michael Owen have recorded their dismay at the club's lack of progress.
And past players are wheeled out daily to compare Houllier's achievements with those of Shankly, Paisley, Fagan and Dalglish.
Yes, Liverpool supporters are living in the past.
Then that is so often what happens in football when the present is too desperate to stomach and the future too dismal to contemplate.
He deserves none of the vitriol but in the end that is why Houllier will go.