When a man is digging his way through the Earth, then he will eventually fall out the other side.
This is what I told myself after Liverpool’s most recent abhorrent performance. Sure, it’s simplistic, but the meaning is clear.
Liverpool are on a hiding to nothing this season, after last season’s nightmare, everything was up in the air. To my dismay, Rafa went first and not the board.
Despite the potentially good work Chris Purslow did in removing the Americans (eventually), he hired Roy Hodgson.
Now, I like Roy, many people do. He seems like a ‘nice’ guy, which is probably a label he detests, however, his tameness in his methods is justification for the tag.
The Rafa years, aka ‘The Champions League Years’ if you wish, seem like a golden age at the moment. Liverpool may have whimpered on occasion, but I had always thought that when the chips were down, we had teeth.
Now we’re just all gummy and frail, a sad state of affairs.If euthanasia were legal in this country, I’d have taken us to the clinic a long time a go.
The next decision for the board, we all know, will be the managers job. Roy isn’t their guy, in fact, he’s know ones guy except for Purslow’s and Hicks, and what relevance do they have any more?
As ever with Liverpool, it’s all about the next step, and after a fresh start off the pitch, it will inevitably a fresh start on it that’s needed.
NESV appear to be clever people, they want to win the fans over just as much as Roy does. I think now is the time were the fans will have the most influence. The board will be keen to get a thumbs up from the faithful, keen to know that when they start spending more time back in America, that things in ol’ Blighty are going well.
They must know that the fans are not in favour of Hodgson, most people don’t detest him, they just don’t want him.
Sure Roy, go off and do well somewhere else, we really wish you the best, but your time here is ticking.
Chanting Dalglish’s name, may have been disrespectful to Mr. Hodgson, but some would argue that his team were disrespectful to the fans in the game against Stoke.
The players, we know, are mostly quality players. Okay, there’s no Mascherano or Aquilani or Insua, but Hodgson stepped into a team with World Cup winners and Champions League winners and just generally, a team of winners.
The quality is there, but he’s just not inspiring them. The war of words Rafa was so fond of, while ridiculed by some, often stoked the players.
They’d go out on to the pitch determined to shove someones comment back down their throat.
In time more and more people will realise we were punching dramatically above our weight, but I looked forward to the next game.
This season, I feel like I’m going to some unwanted school disco. Oh how awkward and cringe-worthy it inevitably is going to be.
If the league wasn’t so competitive this year, with these kind of performances we’d be cut adrift in the bottom half. Luckily we’re still in touching distance of Europe.
However, this is the point of my babble:
Do we need Europe this year?
In the long run, I’m quite happy to allow Roy to battle on to the end of the season. Because if he does, then we’re bound to finish maybe 8th or 7th again? Then NESV get all summer to make the right choice.
The right manager may already be at a club, I’m looking at you Quique, and be unwilling to move until the summer.
That’s part of the reason why I think NESV are reluctant to say ‘we’ll spend in January’. They want to wait and see. While it pains me to wait and see, I think in the grand scheme of things, sticking with Hodgson will be acceptable, until the end of the season. Let him dig his own way to the bottom of the pit, then just let him fall out the other side.
To those who shout for Dalglish, I think appointing the King is dangerous territory. I feel almost foolish whenever I get all excited about the prospect of having him in the dug out, I feel... almost like a Newcastle fan... anyway, the draw backs of having Kenny back.
Say we get him to the end of the season and we finish a respectable 5th, then were do we go? Does he get the job full time? What if it doesn’t work out? Such is our affection for the man that it could be heart breaking to see him sacked the next season. Because, lets be real here, he’s been out of the game for a decade. That’s a huge disadvantage.
There’s more to it than ‘knowing the players’, it’s about your contacts and your philosophies, your training methods and what people you have around you.
After 10 years doing the after dinner circuit and meeting and greeting various suits, it might be too much for him to step back onto the field and make things work.
He’s like a first love that nostalgia helps you to always remember fondly, you want it back but you know deep down that you shouldn’t.
Forget consolidation, Liverpool need to innovate.
We need a manager with an eye to the future, who’s fresh and could offer us 10 years and build a dynasty.
I don’t care if he’s foreign, English, or a dog. If he’s got the skills, the ambition, and the methods, then please let’s snap him up.
If it takes to the summer to get our guy, then so be it. But quick fixes are not what we need now.
