by David Sweeney
Luis Suarez + ‘King’ Kenny
I feel almost dirty saying this as it’s not very often that I agree with Alex Ferguson but his opinion on the cheating little scumbag that is Luis Suarez is near enough spot on. He is a disgrace to Liverpool Football Club although they don’t seem to have any problems in disgracing themselves at the moment. Historically they are a club famed (by themselves) for doing things the right way, the Liverpool way. Well currently and not for the first time they are the both the shame and embarrassment of English football run by clueless Americans, managed by the pre historic Kenny Dalglish whose views on football – and by the sounds of things society – are at least 20 years out of date and implementing the transfer policy with less fore-thought than that of Leeds when they dramatically fell from grace. The United fans chants of ‘always the victim, it’s never your fault’ are both apt and witty above the levels I thought them capable of.
The way Liverpool have dealt with the whole Suarez affair has been nothing but wrong from the very start. All they had to do was to say “Sorry Patrice, it was a misunderstanding” and all of this would have blown over. Originally the Uruguayan confessed immediately to the FA about calling Evra a ‘negro’ throughout the match in question claiming that he didn’t realise it was a derogatory term in England. I find this very hard to believe considering he playing in the multi-cultural Eredivisie for 5 years. Yet low and behold for the next game at Anfield his teammates paraded around around the pitch in Suarez T-shirts during the warm-up whilst the powers that be within the club made accusations against Evra branding him a liar.
The whole Evra/Suarez rivalry comes across like a shit pantomine nobody wants to watch.
Somehow Liverpool spearheaded by Dalglish have made Suarez out to be the victim throughout the whole sorry affair which quite frankly is ridiculous and only serves to alienate the scousers further from the rest of the footballing nation. Whenever I see Dalglish being interviewed or hear him desperately barking in his tiresome Glaswegian tones on the touchline, I cannot help but say to whoever is next to me in the room ‘what an absolute clown he is’ and his constant tendency to make a scene out of everything and play the victim really frustrates me. The only crumb of comfort that can really be drawn from this is that he is almost definitely at the right club who undoubtedly share his small-time mentality.
The whole Evra/Suarez rivalry comes across like a shit pantomine nobody wants to watch. Things started badly with handshake-gate and then got more cringe worthy as Evra attempted to hack down Suarez within the first five minutes. However, he managed to mistime his challenge so badly that he hacked down teammate Rio Ferdinand which reflects the farce that was yesterday at Old Trafford. Suarez refusing to shake Evra’s hand and the way Dalglish acted in his post match interview only pours more scorn on the way LFC have acted throughout this entire fiasco. Although Evra’s ‘celebration’ was childish and unnecessary, Suarez’s belated apology on Sunday afternoon was even more stupid and shows how ridiculous Liverpool as a club have been, No matter what happens next one thing is for sure, they won’t be able to shake this from their beloved ‘ISTREEEE.
Coyle does his best Suarez impression.
Bolton
With recent upturns in Bolton’s results many Bolton fans would have been thinking that Owen Coyle had finally found his best team, and more importantly best formation using the players that he has fit and available. At the start of Bolton’s recent good run was a change in formation as Coyle finally scrapped his beloved 4-4-2 and employed a 4-5-1 giving the team a more solid and balanced look. Fabrice Muamba and Nigel Reo-Coker gave the much changed defence some protection, Mark Davies was given the freedom to support the lone striker, DavidN’Gog who played this role better than Kevin Davies has done for years, holding the ball up, linking up play and creating chances for others.
Performances improved and results against Everton, Liverpool and Arsenal proved that the changes were working well, The Whites moved up the table and out of the relegation zone with games against Norwich and Wigan to come. It was during these two games that Coyle proved that he has not learned from his mistakes, and his stubbornness to play 4-4-2 and incorporate the once great but now past it Kevin Davies once again cost Bolton some much needed points with away games at Manchester City and Chelsea next up.
Having set up at Carrow Road in the much improved 4-5-1 formation the game was still 0-0 at 70 minutes with Bolton looking good for a point at what is proving to be a tough place to visit this season. However instead of accepting that a point would have been a good result in a fixture where Bolton had been second best for much of the game, Coyle decided to chase the 3 points by taking off arguably Bolton’s most important player this season in Fabrice Muamba and replacing him with Davies. Paul Lambert must have thought all his birthdays had come at once as Bolton’s midfield was dismantled, the game was opened up and Norwich were free to cut through Bolton at will and go on to win the game.
As many could have predicted, Bolton’s midfield got completely over-ran.
Many would have thought that this would have confirmed to Coyle that the 4-4-2 formation that saw Bolton lose 20 out of 23 games still was not a viable option if they wanted to continue picking up points and it would therefore have come as a huge surprise to many, not least the Bolton fans, to see that in the following game against Wigan, Bolton had dropped Muamba and replaced him with Kevin Davies. As many could have predicted, Bolton’s midfield got completely over-ran and bottom of the table Wigan dominated the game and came out with the win, with only a wonder goal from Mark Davies giving Bolton a glimmer of hope.
Owen Coyle has been given a lot of support from the Bolton supporters, as many other managers with similar records would have been hounded out long ago. There has long been a sense that the fans were just hoping, more than expecting, Coyle to turn it round with the recent run of form suggesting that it was a possibility. However Coyle’s tactical naivety and stubbornness and refusal to accept any of the blame for negative results must surely mean that he has to now be replaced by a manager with more experience and discipline in order to keep a squad that is easily good enough, in the Premier League.
AVB
Chelsea fans have been reasonably patient with AVB despite his sides obvious underperformance this season. However as they slid to another dismal, disinterested away defeat surely some of the patience afforded is rapidly diminishing. The main reason I believe he has so far got away without much criticism is Abramovic and the fans are sick of seeing managers being sacked, paying out millions in compensation and starting the whole rebuilding cycle all over again. But it must be getting to the point where the inexperienced manager is skating on very thin ice as it looks as though he has completely lost the dressing room. Not just the obvious, JT, Drogba, Lamps clique who he lost well before Christmas, but most of the squad too.
Despite your age Andre, you’re a Premier League manager, start acting like one!
The fabled team spirit has well and truly gone! He appears inept, tactically naive to the point of stupidity and my mother has more pedigree than half of his backroom staff. Add to that my pet hate for the season; the way he crouches on the edge of his technical area is not too dissimilar to the way my dog crouches whilst relieving himself in the local park. Despite your age Andre, you’re a Premier League manager, start acting like one!
As it stands Chelsea face a real battle to finish 4th. No Champions League football next year and there is no doubt that AVB will be out the door with his 3 year plan wedged firmly where the sun don’t shine. Chelsea as a club need the income from Champions League to maintain its current level of domestic performance, failure would mean the enforcement of major cut backs in the playing staff department to come into line with FFP restriction. Basically AVB’s Chelsea career is on a knife edge and for the sake of the club’s future competitiveness they better hope he delivers that much sought after 4th place.
Petr Cech
This weekend saw Petr Cech yet again get a hand to a shot but fail to keep it out, an all too common theme in the big goalkeeper’s play this season. He is definitely not the player he was prior to his head injury. I think that psychologically affected him, and he is now nervous when he’s in close proximity to players’ feet. His form this season is particularly bad and he has cost Chelsea quite a few points. One of the most overrated players in the Prem and Chelsea need to replace him by the start of next season should they wish to have a meaningful title challenge.
The Weather
With almost every match cancelled from League One downwards its time that this cold snap we are going through well and truly clears off so we can all get back to doing what we love. Going to watch our teams play!!
