by jonnymac1979 » Fri Apr 30, 2004 2:11 pm
Date May 24th 2005.
JohnnyMac1979 reporting from Anfield.
So Liverpool, at the same point again. Another season trophyless. Another season of hype, another season of hope and ultimately another season of disappointment.
It isn’t that the fans of Liverpool Football Club don’t deserve success. Their team does play good football. It is based on a tradition of pass and move, all the players supporting and working for each other, based on a great team ethic, and a fantastic team spirit. Once upon a time this team were untouchable in not only the domestic game but in Europe.
Fearless players whose names grace the famous old Anfield stadium, Yeats, Smith, Souness, Case, Dalglish. Goalscoring machines, Hunt, Keegan, Rush, Fowler……and Owen?
So we have to try and figure out where it all went wrong.
At the end of the now infamously disappointing 2003-04 season, Liverpool had managed to cling onto the consolation fourth spot for the Champions League, even though it was a very disappointing campaign for the club. The general compromise for reaching this fourth spot was to give manager Gerard Houllier one more season to prove he could take Liverpool to the next step. By no means was it acceptable that Liverpool ended the season trophyless, or that Liverpool qualified for Europe through the back door.
Houllier was in the Last Chance Saloon and he knew it.
In the close season of 2004/05, Liverpool brought new faces in to freshen up the squad for their assault on the title. Houllier had promised that these players would not fail. They were to be the cornerstone of a new and exciting Liverpool which would help them compete with the now near invincible Arsenal, who had gone the entire previous campaign undefeated in the Premier League. The over hyped Djibril Cisse arrived from Auxerre for £14 million, even after some poor shows for reigning European Champions France at Euro 2004. Phillipe Mexes was brought in for £10 million to bolster up Liverpool’s leaky defence and from Chelsea’s mass exodus, Jesper Gronkjaer arrived (£1.5 million) along with Houllier favourite Joe Cole (£5.5 million).
Of course, the many fans who had publicly been questioning Houllier on TV and radio phone-ins were livid. Chelsea had reached the Champions League semi-finals the previous season and finished second to Arsenal in the Premier League. Liverpool fans were not happy signing players who were not even good enough for Chelsea’s first team. “Houllier Signs Chelsea Cast-Offs” screamed the tabloids.
The situation was somewhat diluted by the fact that Roman Abramovich’s Chelsea were the talk of the football world again. Once again having claimed all the back pages, they spent £170 million over the summer, bringing in players like Vieri, Totti, the Brazilian former World Player of the Year Ronaldo and the England captain David Beckham.
Liverpool had a cull of their own. Amongst others, Dietmar Hamann was on his way back to Germany with Werder Bremen for £3 million. Houllier finally cut his losses on the hugely disappointing Igor Biscan and was sold to Portsmouth for £1.3 million. Fulham paid £7.8 million for Emile Heskey. Marcus Babbel’s contract was cancelled and he signed for Blackburn Rovers. The biggest surprise of all was young Jon Otsemobor, a highly promising full-back making his way across Stanley Park to Everton for £1 million, echoing the Nicky Barmby move a few seasons earlier.
Otsemobor himself, a lifelong Liverpool fan was shocked. “The gaffer hadn’t spoken to me about the deal. I had previously been on loan to Bolton last season, but it didn’t work out so I came back to Anfield. I never wanted to leave.”
The season started with a massive disappointment. In the Champions League qualifiers, Liverpool could only draw with SV Austria Salzburg 1 – 1 over two legs, going out of the competition on away goals. Liverpool were back in the UEFA Cup. Houllier’s face at the end of the match in Austria told the whole story. It was a pained expression everybody had seen far too often before.
In the first game of the new 2004/05 season, Liverpool ran out for the first time in their new home kit. Newly promoted Norwich City were typically welcomed back into the Premier League by the Kop. Just as Norwich were the last team to win in front of the old Kop, they didn’t let themselves down on their return, leaving Anfield with all three points. A goalkeeping blunder by Jerzy Dudek spelled his time at the club was surely up. Djibril Cisse was substituted after a poor display.
Liverpool’s season was once again stuttered and frustrating to say the least. Joe Cole was injured for most of the Christmas fixtures, Cisse looked uninterested, and Michael Owen was again looking perplexed. Liverpool were already out of the Carling Cup losing to West Ham United. They were through to the latter stages of the UEFA Cup, and had made the fourth round of the FA Cup. Their two outstanding players, Gerrard and Mexes would both make the Premier League Team of the Season.
Meanwhile, Chelsea and Arsenal were trying to make history of their own as they battled it out for trophies on all fronts. Both teams were still undefeated in all competitions at Christmas.
In April 2005, with Liverpool now out of all competitions and out of contention for the championship, it was clear to everybody at the club that it was going backwards, not forwards. Injuries and bad luck had again taken their toll. The anti-Houllier graffiti on the walls of Melwood was becoming more vulgar with each and every new message. More and more websites were appearing calling for Houllier’s head. He was quickly labelled a laughing stock.
Off the pitch, even the most loyal of players like Steven Gerrard and Jamie Carragher were privately contemplating their futures. Real Madrid were once again circling dangerously around Michael Owen. Both Gerrard and Owen had made the situation very clear at the negotiations for their previous contracts that they would only sign a one year extension to their existing deal, keeping them at the club until 2006. Houllier had let the situation of the clubs two best players deteriorate to the point that he would go into the new 2005/06 season with neither of them secured on a long term deal, or more frighteningly, the possibility they would leave the club on a Bosman free.
Four Four Two magazine ran an interview with Michael Owen in May 2005. When asked about the interest from a host of overseas clubs, he would not comment on that line of questioning.
Significantly, by not commenting, he had said it all.
The media had a major story on their hands. Owen, who knew how to play the media game, still had a year left on his contract at Liverpool. Continental clubs could smell the blood. Real Madrid president Florentino Perez broke with his usual protocol by publicly saying he would love to bring Michael Owen to the Bernabau. Soon Barcelona, the two Milan giants and Roma joined the queue for the race for his signature. Arsenal even showed interest at one stage. It was painfully obvious to everybody at Liverpool Football Club that Michael Owen was going to leave Anfield. Who could really blame him? Owen was one of the wealthiest men in the game. It was trophies that now fuelled his desire.
Ironically, Liverpool found themselves with four games to go still in with a chance of the final Champions League spot, mirroring the previous year’s campaign. Their main rivals for the spot were Manchester United.
United were going through a transitional stage themselves. With the domestic dominance of Arsenal and Chelsea, an ageing squad, the previous summer’s transfer of Ruud Van Nistelrooy to Real Madrid, as a replacement for Chelsea bound Ronaldo had culminated in seriously depleting the clubs usually high ambition. Alex Ferguson was still in control of the team, but like Houllier, was expected to be replaced at the end of the season.
The official line coming from the Board of Directors was that Owen was going nowhere. Chairman David Moores gave an interview to BBC Sport saying Owen would not leave Liverpool for any price. On the contrary, Owen gave no interviews, would not speak to reporters after training or after matches. After an excellent Man of the Match display at West Bromwich Albion, he refused to partake in the obligatory after match interview, Steven Gerrard awkwardly but professionally taking his place.
On the final game of the season, Liverpool needed three points to claim the final Champions League spot. They could only draw, as bad luck would have it, with Graeme Souness’ Blackburn Rovers at Ewood Park. It was sweet for the former Liverpool midfielder as the draw meant his Blackburn side qualified for the UEFA Cup themselves after a torrid start to the season. Manchester United took all three points at St Andrews and Liverpool had finished the season in fifth place, a place worse off than 2003/04.
The Board had finally lost their patience with Gerard Houllier. He was by now a Dead Man Walking. There was no way Houllier was going to be left in charge of the Owen saga, having left it this late. Houllier did the only thing left he could do and resign, Phil Thompson following him out of the door the next day. It was whispered that the squad had not been genuinely committed to Houllier for some time now. The discipline he had installed so profoundly in the early years of his reign had gone. He never knew his best team, always swapping and changing formations from one game to the next. Many say he was never the same after his life threatening heart operation. Steven Gerrard’s position at the club was immediately put in jeopardy, with Manchester United uncomfortably hovering once again due to Roy Keane finally signing for Glasgow giants Celtic.
The knock on effects were devastating.
David Moores was bought out of the club by local businessman and lifelong fan Steve Morgan. Moores was devastated, the heartache clearly showing on his face at the press conference. Morgan has promised a cash injection of £50 million of his own money for transfers to get Liverpool back into the Champions League.
The plans for the new stadium in Stanley Park were shelved for another twelve months to see what dividends the new season would bring.
Owen is expected to move to Barcelona this summer, a cut-price figure of £12 million is being floated involving a rumoured swap deal with the ageing Davids, Overmars or Kluivert coming this way. Steven Gerrard has signed a one year extension to his existing deal keeping him at the club until the summer of 2007. He is now the highest earner at the club.
Acting manager Hughie McAuley will take charge of the team’s affairs during the summer. He is one of the main reasons Gerrard signed his new deal at the club. The club is rumoured to be interested in Martin O’Neill of Celtic, a man constantly linked with the manager’s job during Houllier’s reign.
Houllier himself is now an honorary ambassador of the game on behalf of FIFA. It is not known whether he will be tempted to return to management.
Anfield should be a very interesting place over the coming months.