Liverpool FC Forum

by **stmichael** » Tue Apr 19, 2005 11:08 am

Viva El Liverpool!

Phil Ball

It was interesting to see the Spanish reaction to Liverpool's victorious draw on Wednesday night in Turin, treating the Scousers' progress as if it were confirmation of the presence of a Spanish team in the Champions League semi-finals. It's quite sweet really, this vicarious sort of pride, coupled with the fact that TV1 commentators José Angel de Las Casas and ex-Real Madrid player Michel are notoriously anti-Italian, despite their grudging admiration.

Michel's problems with Juve are quite personal anyway, and date back to 1996, his last season with Real Madrid. They basically lost in the quarter-finals to the Italians in two bad-tempered encounters, meaning that Michel would retire without ever savouring European success - despite having been one of the main members of Butragueño's famous 'Quinta del Buitre' (the Vulture Squadron). Michel, whose over-smooth tones and slick Armani appearance have been commented on before in this column, also tended to have a bit of a downer on the English, forever accusing them of being technical slouches.

During the last World Cup, for example, he famously referred to England's approach as 'The tactics of the Stone Age'. But now he seems to have changed his tune a little, since he admires Mourinho and likes the way Chelsea try to out-think their opponents, and he also likes the fact that half-a-dozen Spaniards are playing fairly regularly for Liverpool. Michel is still in awe of Liverpool's past, as are so many Spaniards of his generation, many of whom are still pinching themselves awake to the fact that a club with such a classic British resonance has seen fit to re-model itself along Spanish lines.

Liverpool have of course been a fairly cosmopolitan set-up for some years now, but their foreign players have come from all corners of Europe. Only this season have they decided to mine from one specific quarry, first bringing in Rafa Benitez from Valencia, in the full knowledge that he would bring over a Spanish backroom staff and probably several players from La Liga.

That's exactly what he has done, the list comprising Xabi Alonso, Josemi, Fernando Morientes, Luis Garcia, Antonio Nuñez and Mauricio Pellegrino, although the latter is an Argentine. Never mind - he's pretty much a Spaniard now anyway, having played for Valencia for the past six seasons.

Of course, a more cynical view might argue that there's a commercial slant to all of this. Conspiracy theorists point to a sudden spurt in media interest towards Liverpool once it became clear that Spain was on the point of losing its entire basket of Champions League teams, and subsequently its UEFA Cup representatives.

Interesting though Villarreal's flag-flying became, as the last Spanish team left in any European competition, it was hardly the stuff to send advertising executives into raptures. The potential loss of advertising income for both TV1 and TV2, not to mention Canal Plus, has now been partly offset by Liverpool's semi-final berth, weird though that may seem.

Anyway, Michel will have to take sides again now, since Liverpool have been drawn with Chelsea - an all English semi-final for anyone outside of the Iberian peninsula. It is worth noting however that when Liverpool field their full complement of Spaniards, they have more in their line-up than any of Spain's usual European challengers. This weekend, Real Madrid took the honours with five Spaniards in their initial line-up for the away game at Levante, Barcelona fielded four at home to Getafe, the same number as Valencia put out at Mallorca.

Still, there's not much point in fielding five or six players from one different country unless they can actually do the business for you. Although Morientes cannot contribute to Liverpool's campaign, having already featured for Real Madrid in this season's competition, and Xabi Alonso has only just returned from injury, it might be said that Liverpool's performances have generally been better in Europe than in England, perhaps for the simple reason that the new players understand the European scene better.

They're more accustomed to the way that a side like Juventus prefer to play it - more cat and mouse - than to the constant war of attrition that they encounter in the Premiership. But that might be going a little too far. Chelsea's squad seem to have coped well enough, and are now threatening to set the new template.

Xabi Alonso, who played against Juventus (and lost) in the Champions League last season for Real Sociedad, rightly won the plaudits for his more recent performance in Turin, especially given the fact that it was his first full game since Christmas, when he was crocked by Frank Lampard.

Manager Benitez went so far as to compare him to Dalglish, although he wasn't suggesting that Alonso was the same type of player. What he meant was that Alonso had the same potential to become an Anfield legend, to mark a generation. Again, I'm not sure whether he was allowing his post-match emotions to get the better of him, but it's nice anyway that Alonso is getting the attention he undoubtedly deserves.

I remember late last summer when Alonso's transfer to Liverpool was confirmed. He'd been in Real Madrid's orbit for several months, and there had been rumours here in San Sebastián that he'd signed some kind of pre-contract agreement with them - something Xabi always denied.

He has a flat just around the corner from me (well - it belongs to his folks) and almost every morning before he packed his bags to try his luck abroad he would have his café con leche (in a glass) and croissant in my local bar. One morning, as he sat quietly on his own on a barstool reading Marca, some wag standing at the bar quipped 'Xabi! Don't go to bloody Madrid, please!' Alonso looked up from the tabloid and smiled. 'I'm not going there. Don't worry', whereupon the local star went calmly back to his coffee and paper.

What neither I nor the wag knew at that precise moment was that José Antonio Camacho, newly returned to Madrileño fields to sort out the galácticos, had told Florentino Pérez that he didn't fancy Alonso - that he wasn't his type of player. Pérez, who had been previously advised by the Director of Football Jorge Valdano to buy Alonso at all costs, was keen on placating Camacho at that delicate point in proceedings, and wanted him to feel that he he could get his own way, particularly in matters of signings. This had been Camacho's big whinge the previous time he'd walked out on the club. So Alonso was dropped from the shopping list, Benitez replaced Houllier at Anfield, and wasted no time in bringing him over to the Mersey.

In early September, I wrote to three of the English 'quality' broadsheets, offering them a piece on Alonso. As I'd expected, only one of them answered, but it was to decline the offer. They didn't seem to think that the player was news. I'd said in my covering letter that despite all the other higher profile signings that were starting up in the Premiership that September, Alonso was really the one to watch out for. And this is not meant now as a little flurry of self-congratulation.

He'd been at Real Sociedad for almost three seasons, plenty of time for any half-witted observer to note that he was the classiest midfield act in the whole Spanish league. Not only that, he was an intelligent kid, spoke good English, and possessed an admirably mature outlook on life, carrying on with his university career despite the fact that he was already being spoken of as the new Guardiola, and the man to carry the Spanish national side forward into the 21st century.

When John Toshack came back for his third spell at Sociedad in 2001, Alonso's dad, Periko, was caretaker manager and young Xabi, to avoid accusations of nepotism, had been farmed out to Second Division Eibar on loan. The day after Toshack arrived, the Welshman apparently strolled into the office of the Director of Football and asked 'What the **** is Alonso doing at Eibar?'

Justifying his decision to bring him back immediately, Toshack commented that having Alonso at Eibar was like having Maradona in your squad then 'locking him away in the broom cupboard'. When Alonso came back from Eibar (the next day), Sociedad were next to bottom of the First Division. He played every game from then until the end of the season, and was utterly instrumental in their comfortable final position of 13th.

To conclude on a similar theme, Manchester United have finally declared that they are not interested in signing Espanyol's goalkeeper Kameni. They must be mad. Last season, with Lemmens in goal, Espanyol conceded 64 goals. This season they've let in 39. Spot the difference? Kameni saved his sixth penalty this season against Atlético Madrid at the weekend, and was generally brilliant, despite having to put up with ninety minutes of racist [censored] from Atlético's cro-magnon ultras.

It's to be hoped that the fine is something more than 600 euros this time, but if United did sign him, poor Kameni would at least be saved from the fortnightly ritual attacks he has had to put up with this season. Shameful stuff, but he's a great keeper. I was thinking of offering the broadsheets an article on him, but then again, perhaps I'll not bother. Alonso who?

by **Nando** » Tue Apr 19, 2005 11:22 am

that was a great article, to think we almost missed out on xabi but thanks to incompetence of camacho who was sacked within weeks of the season starting we would have missed out on 1 of the brightest talents in the world, we have to do all we can to keep him happy so he can fulfill his ambitions with us because he really is a class act and a model professional

Liverpool FC Forum

Viva el liverpool - Good article

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