Seeing Red

By AM Saturday, October 23, 2010

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Second from bottom, six points from eight games, one win, the team’s worst start to a league campaign since 1953-54, at the end of which it found itself relegated, things at Anfield are looking up – at the 18 teams above them in the championship table. Whatever is happening in the Liverpool board room, on the pitch the reign of the abysmal continues uninterrupted. A draw is considered a good outcome to a game for Liverpool FC these days. Something to be disguised by a cough and change of subject in the glory years, 0-0 is now held up in triumph, proof that the club which has difficulty winning a corner has now turned the corner.

A 2-0 defeat to Everton cannot be described as a good performance. If they continue to come up with such good displays the team will finish bottom on 6 points. At least I did not find out the result of last Sunday’s derby game until ready to board a plane at a Swedish airport the following morning. My Manchester United friend in Belfast never even roused himself to text me as he usually does; the repetition probably too boring for him. Finding out on Monday might have soured the flight but mercifully came too late to spoil a cold but sweet Stockholm.

Spitting Frank Rijkaard is being hotly tipped to take over from current boss Roy Hodgson despite the latter’s claim to be in it for the long haul. Former captain Alan Hansen thinks it unlikely that Hodgson will go so soon, it not being the Liverpool way. But the current hapless league run is not the Liverpool way either so something has to give. Rijkaard would likely spit nails - rather than the saliva he once aimed at West German opponent Rudi Voller in the 1990 World Cup finals - at the team for performances Ray Hodgson describes as good. Ironically, the then international team mate of the spat upon Voller, Jurgen Klinsmann, was approached by the recently deposed US owners as a possible replacement for Rafael Benitez who they badly wanted to shaft. From the fan's point of view Rijkaard may have been the better choice. He might just have spat in both of their greed contorted faces.

Hodgson puts on a brave face between games but the strain underneath shows when his team are staggering about the field of play. Try as he might in post-match press sessions there is no shining a turd. The team he has is crap. One of his pre-season big name signings has been accused of ‘performing recently as if in possession of two left feet.’ Jamie Carragher may have welcomed the coup d’etat that finally rid Anfield of the two US greed gremlins with his comment that it will permit a ‘feel-good’ factor, but without a feet-good factor to go with it, the Reds will languish in the bottom half of the table for the remainder of the season, proclaiming it a triumph if they avoid relegation. As Alan Hansen said of the team after the humiliating defeat at the feet of Blackpool:

The 11 players who started the game should be embarrassed. They were wearing red shirts at Anfield and produced a totally unacceptable performance in a defeat that left Liverpool in the relegation zone. It was an embarrassment. Forget about the history and tradition of the club. Pride also comes into it, but, if the pride isn't there among the players, then there is not a lot of hope for the club.

The lion’s share of culpability does not go to the coach. He took his place at the table with the hand he was dealt, but his tendency to venture out from his burrow, sniff the air and predict good times to come merely sketches an image of Arthur Daley. There have been enough clowns at Liverpool in recent times without the main man trying his hand at a skit.

Liverpool FC will go nowhere until the red shirt replaces the red nose.