The end of last season came at just the right time. Like a breath of air after swimming underwater, there was a sense of relief that it was all over and we could just get our heads above the waves for a little bit. We can all go on holiday, maybe allow our families to see us of a weekend and do something of value of a Tuesday or Wednesday. Life can, for a small while, return to the abnormal. Partners rejoice, you can have your loved ones back. Employers, pray on high, we’re not coming into work on a Monday (as) hungover, the season is over.
At the end of last season, I was beginning to get really f**ked off with football. There is only so many times you can see Emre Can look exposed in the right-back position before “but he’s got boss hair” becomes less of an excuse and more of an expression of attraction. There are only so many times that people can moan about Balotelli before you just wish he would set some fireworks off in his bathroom.
The point is, last season was a big, massive ballache.
I tried to be optimistic. Lord knows I tried. At one point I wrote a piece that stated my absolute belief that Liverpool would beat Manchester United to fourth-place. If I remember rightly, it was about two days before the match we lost 3-0. Against Manchester United. So trying to be positive wasn’t the issue, sometimes the players and the club need to do their bit. And last year they didn’t.
The club have suffered criticism from all over the world. Former players, legends, journalists and fans have stuck the boot in when it was easiest, and yes they have deserved a lot of that negativity, but there is one thing that I think we should all remember from this day forward.
That was last season now.
That was last season. Currently, our league position reads joint top. Drink that in.
I know, I know, that last bit is mostly a joke, but the sentiment reads true. This year can be anything we want. I’m not trying to say we can win the league next year (we so can) but we should let the shackles of last year fall from our bodies and get back to doing what we do best. Being supporters of the club that we all love so, so much.
As a fan, I’ve honestly never felt as negative as I had begun feeling last season, even before the Stoke game, but slowly and surely I’ve recovered. I’ve had a little time to reflect, I got excited by the idea that Klopp could become our manager, and now all of that is over I’m almost ready to put all of my energy and effort into supporting Liverpool again. Properly.
Out of all of the things that have come from the Brendan Rodgers ‘will-he-go-won’t-he-go’ debacle is that one thing is for sure. If he does poorly this year, he will go. For us as fans, we should no see a degree of accountability which should please us. A degree of accountability that we haven’t really had before.
In my opinion, accountability is always the best form of motivation. Rodgers is a man who has a huge ego, but also a huge desire to win, too. At a club the size of ours, that’s what you want. The same people who dislike Rodgers’ self-confidence are probably the same people who complained when Roy Hodgson said we were in a relegation battle during his ill-fated bit-of-time in charge.
I for one would much rather have a guy in charge who backs himself that sacks himself. The reason I bring this up is that Rodgers wants to win, and this knowledge of accountability should spur him of to get the best out of his players, staff and himself. This should be something Liverpool fans should be really, really excited about. I also happen to think that this coming season will we see a team that will be more 2013-14 in style than 2014-15.
Last year we tried to make ourselves a better all-round team once Suarez left. What we sacrificed in bats**t-mental ability we would hopefully gain in defensive solidarity and a sense of boringness than champions are raised on. And what happened with that?
That failed miserably.
Not only were we boring going forward but we were a shambles in defence. We had no kick. No va-va-voom. Instead of finding a striker who had the ability to score goals like Suarez did, we bought loads of lads who didn’t suit our style. We underestimated what it took to get back into the Champions League for a second year.
However, I do see this year as different. I think that this year Rodgers may have realised that finding an appropriate way to defend could be finding a better way to attack. Admittedly, having never seen Firmino play before, people in the know site his defensive attitude as a huge part of his game, defending and harrying from the front in a way that we have missed since Luis Suarez, and something we just can’t get out of the strikers we currently have at the club, with the exception of Daniel Sturridge. He may not be a striker, but he is someone who can help form a first line of defence like we need.
Brendan Rodgers has great ability to set up a team to attack when he knows what he wants to do. Last year I feel for too long he didn’t really know what he fancied. There seems to be an awful lot of people saying that Liverpool needed to have a plan B. Plan B this, plan B that. Why was this, do you think? I think it’s because Gary Neville thinks we need one. Other pundits thought it too. Well let’s remember, this is Gary Neville who failed to help England produce a good enough plan in a World Cup group that we should have qualified from last year. He’s sound, but he is wrong. No, we don’t need a f**king plan B. We need a very good plan A. Like we had when we nearly won the title.
We are not in a position to be winning titles just yet, but we are in a position that having a boss plan A will get us back into the Champions League. We needed to realise what we had when we had it. Suarez didn’t finish second for us, he helped us. So for all the talk of Balotelli and Lambert offering us something a little different, someone should have stopped and said, “No, f**k off, I love our plan A, so let’s just buy some more terriers and get back in the Champions League again.”
The defenders in England aren’t good enough to deal with runners for a full 90 minutes, other than Chelsea. But again, they’re the best in the league, and we aren’t. So why worry? This is something I reckon Brendan Rodgers has realised. Buying Milner, Ings and Firmino mean that Liverpool have injected much needed tenacity into our team, and will most likely take the place of Gerrard, Lambert and Balotelli, who for their merits, all had pretty crap movement. This is a massive improvement and something I’m excited to see on the pitch.
Another reason to be excited is that this year our boys of last summer will be a little more acclimatised to the culture and the league. Emre Can has recently stated that he enjoys the rough-and-tumble of the Premier League, something he’s going to need to prove if he’s to play in his favoured central midfield position.
Alberto Moreno will probably benefit from having harder workers in front of him. Having a Milner or a Henderson instead of a Gerrard helping him out is much better for him as a player and would mean he could prove his worth in a more energetic squad of which he could be a huge attacking outlet.
I am also one of the few people who think Lovren will be better next year than last. Yeah, I know. It’s not something that is hard to achieve. But I feel like the whole issue of his price tag and poor early performances acted as footballing equivalent of quicksand and sucked him in, confidence and all. You don’t just turn into a bad player overnight, and at Southampton he really was a £20million defender. He deserves a chance to drag his career back from the abyss. I also think he’s benefitted from a situation where every other position is changing this year, so the need for even slight steadiness is needed somewhere on the pitch. I fully expect to see him used in also every match during the Europa League next year as a way to try and regain his confidence and rebuild his game over the course of the season. Let’s keep an eye on this one.
You probably won’t agree with some of this, most likely the bit about Lovren, but let’s cancel out last year. It didn’t happen. Forget about it. Refresh the page and get back behind the team, because next year could surprise everyone.
Let’s get back to being Brendan Rodgers’ mad-bastard Reds. Go ‘ed.
