Tomorrow the semis of the best international tournament since Mexico 1986 starts.

EURO2008 has been a tremendous success. The entertainment has been excellent. Brilliant goals, new stars has appeared, and late, late drama. The Euros has had it all.

But first and foremost EURO2008 has shown the way forward for football. It has shown what the future will bring.

It is quite simply the start of a new era.

Mobility, speed and stamina.

Those are the key words. Those are the main components that herald the future of the beautiful game.

And no one is a better example of this, and few teams are more beautiful, than Guus Hiddink’s Russia.(pictured above)

Brian Barwick must be kicking himself. What if England had appointed the Dutchman after Sven Göran Eriksson left in 2006, instead of plumping for that man with the umbrella?

Hiddink’s philosophy is the way forward for modern football. It is a way that doesn’t consist of rigid formations and set patterns. It is a philosophy that is based on quick players, all capable of beating opponents. It is based on mobility, where players change positions all the time. It is also based on stamina. The workaholic Russian midfielders and full backs quite simply run their opponents into the ground.

It is total football reinvented.

And indeed, Hiddink’s home nation, the inventors of total football, are another example of the new virtues that will dominate modern football.

Holland were breathtaking in the group stages. Van der Vaart, Sneijder, Van Nistelrooy, Van Persie and Robben’s technique, pace and slick passing tore the last World Cup’s finalists apart. And Engelaar, De Jong and Kuyt’s hard work enabled them to do so. It was fantastic football, performed by athletes that combined those three main assets that will be at the core of football in the future: Mobility, speed and stamina.

Jaime Carragher teased his Spanish Liverpool team mates ahead of the Euros, saying that they lacked the physique and pace of the French.

Carragher was right in pointing to how important physique and pace are in modern football. But he forgot that speed is not only about how quick a player runs, it is also about how quick the ball moves.

And the Spanish have excelled in this compartment. Yes, with exception of Torres, defensive midfielder Senna and the defenders, Spain lacks height and strength. But the slight frames of Silva, Villa, Iniesta, Xavi and Fabregas have the ability to move the ball around with such crisp precision and quickness, that opponents are torn apart. This is where Portugal failed against the Germans. Despite possessing world class ball players, they dwelled to long, taking too many touches, and becoming too static. 

Manchester United showed a lot of the same as the Russians, the Dutch and the Spanish have done in the Euros, in their title winning campaign last season. The way Rooney, Ronaldo, Tevez and Park changed positions, the way all their front players are capable of beating opponents, the way all their players have quick feet capable of finding team mates with passes from the most tight angles and positions, the way full back Patrice Evra covers every blade of grass on his side.

That workaholic approach is the key to the free flowing, free moving modern football. In a world without rigid formations and structures, balancing deep midfielders (Senna, Engelaar, Zyryanov), and the work ethic of the team are crucial. The Russians have proved this. When the Dutch where running on empty in the quarter final – despite resting their entire starting eleven in the last group game – Arshavin, Zhirkov, Torbinsky and the other Russians were still running around as if the game had just started. It has been the same with Hiddink’s previous teams. Remember how hard the Koreans worked at the World Cup in 2002? Up and down, up and down, all the time.

That enthusiasm and movement is crucial. That was lacking for England at the last World Cup. The English players were moving around at pedestrian pace. The Germans, despite having a worse team player for player, showed how it should be done. Klinsmann’s Germany of 2006 reached the semi finals with their enthusiastic, eager and run-until-you-drop style. Now Joachim Low’s 2008 outfit has done the same.

Movement, how fast the ball travels and how disciplined and hard working the players are, those are the main components of modern football.

Hiddink has understood this. And he is the real star of EURO 2008. In a time where we have plenty of spectacular and entreating players, but no one that rises above the rest and clearly are the best player in the world (like Platini, Maradona and Zidane were), we can at least say who is the best national team coach in the world.

He is Guus Hiddink, the man England missed out on.

I’ll round of by selecting my all star XI of Euro 2008 so far. Do you agree?

Top of the Tops:

Goalkeeper: Artur Boruc (Poland)

The Celtic goalie was immense in the group stages. Poland would have been embarrassed without him.

 

Right back: Sergio Ramos (Spain)

Has often been criticised for neglecting his defensive duties, but so far the Real Madrid heart throb has excelled both defensively and when he has joined the attack.

Left back: Yuri Zhirkov (Russia)

The revelation of the tournament, alongside his team-mate Arshavin. Why is this fella at CSKA Moscow, and not playing for one of the big guns in Western Europe? Fantastic physique and stamina and a deadly left foot. The Russian Roberto Carlos. Bombs up and down the left flank. 

Centre half: Per Mertesacker (Germany)

Good in the air. Lacks pace, but has yet to be caught out. Has hardly put a foot wrong.

Centre half: Pepe (Portugal)

The Real Madrid man was excellent in the group stages.

Midfield: Konstantin Zyryanov (Russia)

Fantastic against the Swedes, not so dominant against Holland. But his calming presence, and his combination of grit and guile makes him crucial for Guus Hiddink’s team.

Midfield: Wesley Sneijder (Holland)

The best player of the tournament in the group stages. Fantastic movement, brilliant ball control and shoots equally well with both feet.

 

Midfield: Michael Ballack (Germany)

Was Chelsea’s best player in the league run in, and has continued his good form in the Euros. Has the ability to rise to the occasion.

Attacker: Andrei Arshavin (Russia)

The star of the tournament. Quick feet, a nose for goal and pace to burn. Will surely join one of Europe’s elite clubs after the summer.

 

Attacker: David Villa (Spain)

The tournament’s top scorer so far. He will probably be so after the final as well. Good movement, a stinging shot and the ability to be on the right place at the right time.

 

Attacker: Luka Modric (Croatia)

Nicknamed “Little Cruyff”. He wears Cruyff’s old shirt number (14), and even looks like the old Dutch maestro. He plays like him too. Tottenham fans must be rubbing their hands with glee at the thought of watching this brilliant little footballer at the Lane next season.

My Team of Euro 2008 

 

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In May, the most prestigious European Cup will get an English winner. For the 11th time. You mark my words…

Has English club football ever been better? Perhaps in the late seventies and early eighties, but probably not. Four English teams out of the eight quarter finalists, and unless Fenerbache can pull off TWO major shocks, we are more or less guaranteed at least one English team in the Champion’s league final. No country has ever had four representatives in the quarter-finals of Europe’s top club competition before. England (2000/01 and 2006/07), Germany (1997/98), Italy (2004/05 and 2005/06) and Spain (1999/2000, 2000/01, 20001/02 and 2002/03) have all had three in the past.
 

In the nineties Serie A dominated the European cups, so far this millennium the Spanish league has done the same. But there seems to be a shift in power now. It probably has happened already, with the Premiership having taken over the mantle. Last season England had three teams in the semis. That could very well happen this season as well.
Some have argued that the Spanish league still holds the lead. That the Premiership is all about the might and financial muscle of the so called big four. Or is it just that the money in football now means that in all the big leagues the top clubs are just in a different league compared to the lesser lights? After all, for Bolton and Wigan in England, read Murcia and Levante in Spain, or Catania and Siena in Italy.

I think it all boils down to this…

The top dogs in the three biggest leagues, England, Spain and Italy, are so powerful that they basically can buy whoever they want, that they can offer their players salaries that others only can dream of, and off course as they are so regular Champion’s League contenders, they have a pulling power that other clubs cannot compete with.
Manchester City and Aston Villa for instance, have enough Thai bath and American dollars, to buy and pay top players, but will they win a tug of war over a player if the competition is called Manchester United, Real Madrid or Inter? Probably not.
 

A chasm has opened up in the top leagues. Basically you have three divisions within the Premiership, Serie A and La Liga. The Champion’s League regulars at the top, the UEFA Cup hunters behind them, and the relegation candidates at the bottom. And it is difficult to see teams breaking out of these groups in the long run.
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As a Liverpool fan there are two words that make my neck hairs stand straight up. The first one is “Istanbul” (no explanation is needed). The other word is “2001″.

In my last post I wrote about the manager situation at Anfield. And with current developments, it could be tempting to write another piece on that subject. (I can not believe the amount of Liverpool fans who are rooting for Mourinho to take over. Have they forgot what that man said about our football club only a few years a go? The contempt he treated Liverpool fans with at the 2005 Leauge cup final? Mourinho was massively booed at the 2005 CL semi final, and in the following matches we faced Chelsea. And now these people want him as our manager? What next? Salman Rushdie as president of Iran?)

But enough about current plights, and ramblings about who shall and shall not be manager at Anfield come August 2008.

Let us instead go down Memory Lane - a pleasant walk for any Liverpool fan.

No, I am not going to write about St. Etienne, the glory of Rome in 84, or the above mentioned Istanbul.

Let us talk about 2000/2001.

My favourite year!

As a football fan my year goes from August to July, not from January to December. At the start of the year (in august 2000 in other words), I enrolled at Liverpool John Moores University - where I was supposed to study journalism for three years. (Instead I ended up spending the vast majority of those three years in the pub - a lot of the time in company with this site’s editor!)

The reason John Moores University was my preferred top choice at Uni was not the incredible stature that particular University has as a journalism school, it had of course all to do with my love or Liverpool Football Club

As I am not born and bred on Merseyside (yes, I’m one of those pesky out of towners), this was my chance to follow the Red Men on a regular basis - not for one whole season, but for three.

Let us make a jump in space and time again. This time to the period preceding my enrolment at John Moores. Back to  the time I was still slaving at school here back home in Norway, passing time chasing after pretty blonde little things in skirts, watching footie on the telly, and reading everything I could get my hands on when it came to English football. Fanzines, match day programmes and books. A lot of books. (No wonder I was the teacher’s pet in my English class, as a teenager I had probably read more English than she has in her entire life)

My favourite footie book is called “My Favourite Year”. Published by the When Saturday Comes magazines, and edited by Nick Hornby. It is a collection of 13 tales by 13 famous football fans and writers, where they all describe their favourite season.

Inspired by that, I will now go trough the highlights of my favourite year. A year that saw me jump up and down with John Aldridge, share an elevator ride with Ron Atkinson, stamp on Frank Stapleton’s coat and last but certainly not least, saw me witness Liverpool win three cup finals.

The first memorable match of the 2000-2001 season was the Merseyside derby at Anfield. This early in the season, I still had not sorted out my press accreditation.

Yes, I freelanced my self trough my favourite year. I paid for my football by writing about the football I saw. Genious! On one occasion I covered a Walsall - Barnet FA Cup game at the Bescott stadium, when I suddenly noticed I had been standing the entire first half with muddy shoes on the coat hung over the seat in front of me. That coat belonged to Frank Stapleton! Finally, pay back time for that 1985 FA Cup semi final loss against the Mancs!

The only way I got hold of a ticket for that derby game was by buying of a tout. Something I hate doing, and something I have only done once ever since.

To my nightmare, someone was sitting in my seat when I finally entered Anfield five minutes after kick off.

A bluenose!

 I feared that I had bought a fake ticket. But after wandering aimlessly around the Annie Road End for the first few minutes, I simply hoped for the best and asked a steward for help. Thank God, that bluenose was sitting in the wrong seat. My ticket was the real deal after all.

The game can be summed up in two words: “Nick” and “Barmby”.

The winger had just joined from the dark side. And I will never ever forget that wall of sound when he, of all people, headed home for Liverpool’s first goal.

Kevin Campbell equalised, but Liverpool were easy winners against a piss poor Everton side in the end.

Another memory from that game is a fresh faced Steven Gerrard, at right back, tackling left winger Idan Tal so hard that the Israeli literally flew of the pitch and landed in the stands!

I can still remember standing among the Liverpool fans on the Sheil Road Circular bus going back in to town after the game, singing “He’s red, he’s white, We bought him from the shite. Nick Barmby, Nick Barmby…”

Outside it was pissing down (that autumn had the most rain recorded in history), inside it was all sunshine.

On a more curious note from that autumn, I remember swapping scarves with a drunk Czech, who looked and smelled like he had drunk all the Cains in Liverpool, in the Albert before the game against Slovan Liberec (A more bizarre experience was probably watching Bernard Diomede playing in that same game. My God, how did that impostor of a professional footballer ever win the World Cup!)

But it was in the spring that the 2000-2001 season really picked up the pace.

Liverpool were making great strides under Gerard Houllier, but even before Christmas - despite a Danny Murphy winner at Old Trafford - it was evident that we were never ever going to catch Man United and Arsenal in the league. In fact, keeping Leeds United and Ipswich at bay was going to be more than difficult (Leeds! Ipswich!!)

However, we where doing brilliantly in all three cup competitions. Chelsea (with a late goal from the returning Robbie Fowler), Stoke (8-0, Tim!), Fulham (then outside the Premier League) and a mauling of Crystal Palace at Anfield put us in the final of the League Cup. Rotherham, Leeds (who back then was rather good) and Joe Royle’s Man City were put to the sword in the FA Cup.

By February The Kop had a new ditty to sing. “Tell me ma, me ma, to put the champagne on ice. We’re going to Cardiff twice”

The first trip with Barnes’ coaches from Lime Street to the Welsh capital was made in February, as Sander Westerveld’s heroics gave us the trophy and a memorable and happy coach ride back home (I can remember a snow ball fight at a service station in the Midlands somewhere. The only time I have ever seen snow in England).

But The Millennium Stadium was not the only destination we had in sight. Looming on the horizon was also the Westfalen stadion in Dortmund. After being in the doldrums when it came to European football after the UEFA ban, Liverpool fans where finally getting a regular fix of our preferred drug: European glory.

Today the UEFA cup is viewed as nothing more than a distraction by most clubs. But in 2000-2001 it was the source of rebirth and new hopes for Liverpool FC. And also, have there ever been a UEFA cup with such quality as in 2000-2001?

We knocked Fabio Capello’s Roma out in February, thanks to a fantastic Michael Owen in the Stadio Olympico, and thanks to a fantastic Kop who scared the beejeesus out of a Spanish ref at Anfield.

Remember this was at a time when Serie A, quite rightly, was regarded as the by far best league in the world. And later that year Roma won the league title.

In the next round we beat a very good FC Porto side comfortably - two years before the same Porto side won the UEFA Cup, three years before the same FC Porto side won the Champions Leauge.

In the semi FC Barcelona awaited.

Roma, Porto, Barca… Arguably we defeated tougher opposition our way to the 2001 UEFA cup triumph, than when we won the Champions League in 2005.

The day after Liverpool had beaten Wycombe at Villa Park to qualify for the FA Cup final, I travelled up to Anfield and queued for seven - yes 7 - hours to get my hands on a ticket for the semi final against Barca at Anfield. Finally reaching that ticket office window was like sex! (And very much like the first time I had sex, I went straight home and slept for ten hours afterwards! I was knackered)

A funny story: I was in that line with my mates Declan and Dermott. When they phoned me up they day before, to arrange where and when we should meet up, my Spanish flat mate Eduardo answered. His grasp of the English language was pretty much at the same level as the current England manager has now. When Declan asked “Is that you Eric?”, Eduardo answered “I don’t know!”

Those seven hours queuing around Anfield on a cold Monday morning was well worth it tough.

Gary McAllister netted from the spot (that penalty would have hit me full on in the face had it not been for the Anfield Road End net).

Oh joy! Oh jubilation!

After 16 Liverpool had finally a European final to play.

But before that, there were matters to address in the league. Yes, Man United and Arsenal were light years ahead in the league.

But there was still a lucrative Champions League spot to play for. George Burley’s Ipswich had, as most people expected, ran out of steam. Leeds was the main challenger (only three English teams qualified back then).

It was a major blow when goals from Rio Ferdinand and Lee Bowyer gave the Yorkshire outfit a undeserved win at Anfield on Good Friday.

On Easter Monday Liverpool quite simply had to win. If not, that first ever Champions League entrance was at least another year away.

The oposition? Everton at Goodison.

In my 70-80 or so games watching Liverpool live, I have been lucky to experience many memorable moments, and I have seen many more from in front of a television set. But of all my Liverpool experiences, my favourite ever memory is the 3-2 win at Goodison in April 2001. Yes, it even beats Istanbul!

It was a thrilling game. Heskey scored. “In for a week, out for a month, Duncan is a tampon” Ferguson equalised. Babbel scored. Then Biscan was sent off by the truly awful Jeff Winter. Then Everton got the mother of all soft penalties (Yes mister Moyes, Everton got a soft penalty in a derby match). That hippo David Unsworth levelled.

Oh no!

We could forget it now.

Another year in the UEFA Cup awaited. Slovan Liberec and Dundee United rather than Real Madrid and Bayern Munich.

But then. Three minutes into injury time Liverpool won a free kick 44 yards out. Gary McAllister floated the ball into the box. Sami Hyypia rose like some 14 year old school boy’s cock in a strip bar. The flying Fin met the ball perfectly. It was going in! Yes!

…but no. Everton’s otherwise ordinary goalkeeper Paul Gerrard delivered a stunning save. All the Liverpool fans could not believe it!

We were all still holding our heads in disbelief when late substitute Gregory Vignal (remember him?) won another free kick in almost the exact same position.

Everybody expected another long ball into the box from McAllister. But Gary Macca had other ideas. Instead he placed the ball perfectly in the diving Gerrard’s bottom corner.

To this day I will never ever forget the sounds around me, as I sat here in the Goodison Park press box.

First total and stunned silence. Then an almighty roar from the travelling Kop on the other side of the pitch. Then the fump-fump-fump sound as 30.000 Everton fans simultaneously rose from their seats and headed for the exits. Then the sound of my own voice going “Aaaaaaargh” and out drowning the fella in front of me who was also jumping up and down letting out primal screams. That fella was John Aldridge, commentating on the game for the local radio.

If football brings me nothing but disappointment and hurt in the next 50 years, I would gladly take it and suffer it just to experience just two second of that feeling I had as Gary McAllister curled that ball into the Everton net on Easter Monday 2001.

Of course there was more curling and more scoring from McAllister in the following weeks.

When we entered the last week of the 2000-2001 season, Liverpool had three cup finals in eight days.

Arsenal in the FA Cup on Saturday the 12th, Alaves in the UEFA Cup on Wednesday the 16th and Charlton in the league on Sunday the 20th. A win at The Valley, and qualification for the Champions League was dead certain.

I can still remember the fantastic vision of the Millennium stadium bathed in glorious sunshine, as I made my way up the gantry for the 2001 FA Cup final. Due to a shortage of tickets in the writer’s press box, my paper at the time had managed to get me a press pass alongside the TV and radio commentators. The view was spectacular!

As I watched Arsenal totally outplay Liverpool and take the lead 1-0, I was sat squeezed in between the commentators of Norwegian channel TV2 and David Ginola commentating for some French channel.

Before I went down to Cardiff, my Arsenal supporting friends (I have got a few) reminded me that this was the fourth time Liverpool and Arsenal met in a cup final. In 1950 Arsenal had won thanks to goals from Lewis. In 1971 they had won thanks to goals from Graham and George, and in 1987 they had won thanks to goals from Nicholas. “And now, we have Henry” they said.

“But yes, we have Owen” I answered.

I could also have pointed out that when Liverpool meet Arsenal in FA cup finals, the team that wears gold and blue win.

Well, you all know what happened. Michael Owen, dressed in gold and blue, turned the game on its head. (Try to write a play about that, Mr. Hornby!)

One down, two to go.

I was not able to get a ticket for the UEFA final in Dortmund (Maybe Luke can write about that one?)

So the final was watched in the student’s union in the Haigh building on Mount Pleasant in Liverpool. Everything went fine. Babbel scored, Gerrard scored. We were cruising.

But then the ale pressed on. I had to go to the toilet. Alonso (no, not Xabi) pulled one back while I was out taking a leak. Gary Macca, in the form of his life, restored the two goal advantage.

Just after the restart I went to the toilet again. When I came back Moerno had scored - not once, but twice! Fuck!

Fowler netted, and with another couple of bottles of Becks (£1,45 a piece, if I remember correctly) necked, I decided to sneak out for another quick leak (I know, I know).

When I came back, Yordi Cruyff, of all people, had made it 4-4!

Extra time came. I was drunk now, all I can remember is standing with my legs crossed, desperately trying not to think about my undersized blather. Oh, and some unfortunate chap called Geli slicing a Gary Macca free kick into his own net.

Two down, one to go.

Next up Charlton. Once again, I had not been able to get a ticket. I can remember watching the game in the pub. I can remember Liverpool having a highly uncomfortable first half, and then Fowler scored with an over head kick, and we cruised to 4-0 and Champions Leauge qualification.

Three down, mission completed.

A couple of days later 300.000 people (Everton, the people’s club my ass!) turned up in the streets of Liverpool to watch an open top bus parade that had, as one banner proclaimed, more cups than a bra factory.

In the end it was the right decision to let Gerard Houllier go. At the end Liverpool was going backwards under him. But we should not forget that after many barren years, he gave us belief, pride and trophies. Liverpool would never have won in Istanbul, had it not been for the big game experience Gerrard, Carragher et al built up under Houllier.

I always felt that Gerrard Houllier came in, and still does, for unwarranted criticism. Yes, he had his faults, and it was right to let him go in the end, but he certainly gave us some glorious moments - while almost ending up paying with his life, least we forget.

But for me, he first and foremost gave me my favourite year!

What about you? Do you have a favourite year, or any favourite football experiences?

When Liverpool got new American owners this spring, a lot of Manchester United supporters questioned why the Liverpool fans didn’t protest against the move more stubbornly then they did. Having arranged massive protest against the similar overtaking of their own club by the Glazer family, they didn’t understand how the Liverpool fans could greet their new Yankee owners with such celebration. Now it looks like those questions were justified.

Yes, Gillett and Hicks played the PR-game perfectly at the beginning. Coming out with all the right noises, all the right sound bites. But now, Liverpool’s American honeymoon is over. Reality is setting in. And for the first time since they seized control of Britain’s must successful football club, George Gillett and Tom Hicks find themselves under fierce criticism from a vast majority of the Liverpool fans. It is the serious broad sheets that are leading the way; it isn’t the Sun or the other tabloids. Serious papers are writing that Benitez will be out of a job sooner rather than later – and no statement has been released, yet, where the owners show their support for Benitez. If you want the Rafalution to continue, it doesn’t look good.

Many newspapers have over the last few days written that Rafael Benitez has picked a fight he cannot win. Because, as Jose Mourinho found out, in modern football it is the men controlling the purse strings that now control the game. Well, by going against the Liverpool supporter’s wishes, it looks to me like it is the Americans who have picked a fight they cannot win. Sure, they can sack Benitez, but at the same time they will lose the vast majority of Liverpool Football Club’s main asset: the fans. I’m not talking about day-trippers from Bury St. Edmund, Trondheim or Donegal, but the loyal match going Reds, the season ticket holders from Bootle, Dingle and Huyton.

In this conflict, I cannot avoid thinking that the two Americans are seriously underestimating the Kopites. If the unjust sacking of the manager who brought Ol’Big Ears back to Anfield on a permanent basis goes trough, the before mentioned Manchester United supporter’s protests will seem like a San Francisco hippie love in from the late 1960’s. Yes, Benitez should have kept his criticism within the club, and not so actively used the press to get his point across. And yes, this is one of those conflicts where it is not black and white. None of the parties involved can claim to be 100 per cent right, none of the involved parties can claim that the opposition doesn’t have valid arguments. The two Americans anger at Benitez’s public outbursts are understandable, and it is unworthy of the manager of a gentleman’s club like Liverpool to use the kind of tactics that Benitez has used over the last week or so. But at the same time they should handle football related criticism from the man that is paid to decide on the football matters at Anfield, and that should always be the manager.

Frustration at the Liverpool suits’ slowness in transfer negotiations is nothing new, and is something that existed long before the two Americans arrived. Remember Simao Sabrosa? When it comes to negotiating - and more importantly, going through with – transfer deals, Liverpool aren’t exactly moving like Ian Rush onto a Kenny Dalglish through ball, but more fittingly like Neill Ruddock giving Jan Molby a piggy back ride.

So it is understandable when, according to reports, Benitez is close to a few cheap deals, but isn’t allowed to seal them because Mr. Hicks and Mr. Gillett wants to wait until they arrive in England just before Christmas, that Spanish frustrations run high at Melwood. Benitez hasn’t lost his temper because Hicks and Gillett have refused to sanction a big money move for some International superstar, but rather because the green light isn’t given to what can be described as minor transfer deals, and because the mighty Liverpool FC – one of the major trademarks in the World - is run via e-mails and a fax machine in Texas.

Apparently Liverpool have been close in recent weeks to clinch a £4 million pound deal for AC Milan’s Kakha Kaladze, wrap up a couple of Bosman player’s for next season, and sign a few talented but cheap South American youngsters. But all this is put on hold until the two Americans arrive on Merseyside for the game with Manchester United on the 16th – thus putting it all in danger as other clubs are hovering over the same targets. The transfer window means that you can only sign players in January, but that doesn’t mean that it isn’t necessary to get all the groundwork in, in advance.

Personally, my main beef with the American owners is their lack of involvement in the day to day running of the club. I cannot help but think that Rafa feels the same way. Hicks and Gillett visit Liverpool around every two months, all the major decisions are made through e-mails and phone calls across the Atlantic. Mr. Gillett’s son Foster, who is supposed to be at Anfield to run the show together with Rick Parry, has apparently been spending more time back home in the States lately, than in Liverpool. The new American Liverpool seems to be like a car with the engine in England, and the steering wheel in America. The main course of concern for me, is Rafael Benitez’s boldness. Has the situation gone so far that Benitez feels that he now has nothing to lose? Is the fact that Benitez now uses the media as his outlet a sign that he feels himself that his time at Anfield is running out? Or even worse, is Benitez using this as a tactic to speed up the process of his own departure, because he sees that it will happen sooner rather than later anyway?

I think it boils down to one headstrong and stubborn Spaniard, who knows how Liverpool FC works, and who knows where the chink in the Americans armour is: Their lack of history in the game of soccerball, and their lack of historical knowledge when it comes to Britain’s most successful soccerball team. Rafael Benitez hears his name being chanted at every game, not at least so in the last outing at St. James’ Park. He is well aware of his own popularity, and I believe he attempts to use this as a stick to beat the Americans. Or rather, he gives the stick to the Kopites, so they can swing it for him.

When Liverpool face Porto and Bolton later this week, Gillett and Mr. Hicks will see what fans’ passion is all about. This isn’t hockey, baseball or the NFL. This isn’t bowl shaped stadiums filled with middle-aged rednecks sitting still, sipping their Budweiser while they punch the air and let out screams of “Yeah!” every five minutes or so. This is real football, real feelings and real fans. By picking a fight with Benitez, the two Americans have also picked fights with the Liverpool fans. Perhaps seen by the Americans as nothing more than “customers” in their new soccerball business. But this will not be an American dream for George and Tom. If they do sack Benitez, it will turn into a nightmare, because as a poster on a Liverpool forum wrote here the other day:

“The Yanks have the money, but we have the scousers…”