After watching Steven Gerrard’s dreams die again last weekend, this time at the hands of ex-Red and professional snide Scotsman Charlie Adam, Sunday afternoon left me reeling in agony with the realisation that there is actually no point in anything whatsoever.
First of all, there’s no point in sentiment. Why? Because it doesn’t exist. Not in football, no chance. The football world has taken the opportunity for a sentimental goodbye to possibly Liverpool’s greatest ever player, had it twatted all over the park at the Britannia Stadium, and sarcastically topped off with a goal so reminiscent of his old self that it could in fact only have happened thanks to injury to the chasing Muniesa. Liverpool’s last twelve to eighteen months have been so riddled with the need for sentiment for Steven Gerrard that it has been physically damaging to the club’s image. “Win the league for Stevie!” Bottled it. “Win Europa for Stevie!” Bottled it. “Get Champions League for Stevie!” Bottled that. “Win the FA Cup for Stevie!” Bottled that too. “Win at Anfield for Stevie!” Fucking bottled it. “Just fucking win Stevie’s last game!” Well and truly, fucking bottled it.
Secondly, why bother with commitment? There’s no point in that either. Look at the grand mass of players who have been committed to their beloved clubs. Gerrard, Totti, Zanetti, to name a few. What have they got in common? Underachievement, in buckets. These kinds of players, the ones who go down as cult heroes, are just as fucking stupid as they are admirable. These players, the elite who carry the mediocre, are the equivalent of the idiotic romantics who stumble back into the same failing relationships over and over again. They flirt with success, and the idea of building a platform to elevate themselves above the dire straights of inconsistencies that plague the happiness that they dream of, but at the end of the day they still go to bed hating the fact that “things aren’t like they used to be” while their best friend turned closest rival bends the rest of the big boys over a desk as they down shite champaign straight from the Premier League trophy.
Next on the agenda is logic. Not the concept of it, but the actual act of being logical. Why bother? Evidently it doesn’t work. All of the top lads, the ones who actually win things and still turn a profit, they’re not logical with sound and simple business principles. Wait, what? You’re telling me they are? Ah yeah, you might be right. Of course you’re fucking right. But what does that matter to the mighty Liverpool Football Club? Oh no, it doesn’t. So long as we maintain that “no one is bigger than the club” and bang on about the “Liverpool way” more often than Carl Froch reminds literally everybody he meets that he *almost* sold out Wembley Stadium. Now let me open your eyes, Liverpool and its fans alike. The players are every bit as big as the club, and they need to be fucking treated that way, because otherwise we’re going to be stuck with the same shower of shite that’s carried us to a mega impressive five out of six seasons finishing below fifth in the league. Why? Because every player who could possibly carry us further proceeds to reek havoc with our fancy American wage structure, and then fuck off quicker than a category five hurricane the very second they realise that we do not compete with the top clubs of the world in any way, shape, or form. And what even is the “Liverpool way”, now? Because all I see is failure and shortcomings. Call me naive, but I don’t believe that makes for a superb claim of identity, and funnily enough neither do our transfer targets, the money grabbing little twats (*sounds sarcasm klaxon*).
Now, the past. Legends. Trophies. Signings. Failures. What’s the fucking point in any of them? The last lad we signed from Spain was shite. So what? Diego Costa kicked, punched, and head-butted anything from balls to bollocks to win Atletico’s first La Liga title in eighteen years, and yet we weren’t quite sure he was the man to lead our attack prior to or post Suarez’s departure. Furthermore, trophies mean virtually fuck all too, especially when you don’t fucking win any truly significant ones for over ten years. Five champions league titles? Don’t care, doesn’t stop the likes of Willian choosing both Tottenham and Chelsea ahead of us. And then the legends, the best of the bunch. “So and so used to play here, and he was loved eternally!”. Yeah, cheers Brendan, because explaining to twenty-one year old Luciano Vietto how Ian St John once scored a hat-trick on his debut against Everton in 1961 is definitely going to turn his head, despite the fact that you’ll inevitably neglect to mention the fact he used to play for a packet of crisps and a fucking bus pass. What’s so good about them? They all talk shite. Phil Thompson, John Aldridge, Mark Lawrenson, they all talk utter drivel. Even Carragher! Not Carra’, he’s supposed to be just like us! Guess what? He is, every other comment he makes is a fucking fallacy too!
So what’s the point of all this? The point is that Liverpool Football Club are a bunch of soft, failing, gargantuan turbocunts who – under the current regime – have no idea, not a single notion, of the requirements for success. And yes, it might seem oh so ironic that I stand here giving it large as an unpaid blogger, but it’s time that someone pulls down the nostalgic posters that keep everyone confident that we are a big club, when we’re so evidently not.
Is Brendan Rodgers the man to take Liverpool forward? Probably not. His shortcomings include his ability to coach a defence, to control the media, to maintain a system, to sign good players, and to keep his best ones; so pretty much everything the club stands for. Not that that should matter anymore, as everything the club stands for has been thrown out of the window anyway. Liverpool Football Club have demoted themselves to a standing unworthy of a single man – Steven Gerrard – in their treatment of his expatriation. In fact, the entire coverage of Gerrard’s departure has been a pretty fucking damning indictment of the fall of the club, and the sudden realisation that something needs to be done pretty fucking quick, or else we’re beyond mediocrity and into the real shit. What was once a section on the website highlighting the club’s delusions of grandeur is now a shrine to Steven Gerrard, a man who was moderately successful and although probably not the best, definitely up there with the likes of Dalglish. It was king Kenny himself (and a number of others) who said “no player is bigger than this club”, and yet for over two weeks Liverpool’s entire social media roster has been dedicated to Steven Gerrard rather than the relatively important remaining Premier League games.
Finally, the point is that someone needs to take a hold of Liverpool, give the club a good, firm, shake, and reinvent the image. Stop bringing in utter codswallop that costs twenty million pounds and doesn’t improve us in any possible manner. Sack the shithouses who were originally allowed to make those decisions, too. Be fucking ruthless. Because Liverpool Football Club is about success, not sentiment. So for once, hierarchy of the club, take a look at the state of things, and replace failures with fuckers who really know how to be successful, rather than how to write a fucking dossier and act like Billy-big-balls in their refusal to work with a director of football, i.e, someone who could actually fucking help combat their inexperience (COUGH Brendan, you silly shite COUGH). Sign players off with emotional, meaningful, and most importantly, victorious final games rather than dragging it out so long that we start to look like a club about as big as Wigan. Pay what’s necessary to sign true quality for a short while, and once there’s a model of success in place impressive enough to attract the best up-and-coming talent, fap yourself silly over implementing your bloody wage structures. Do something, anything, to be successful, because right now, we’ve got nothing.
Just please, oh please Liverpool, stop making me hate you.