Liverpool v Chelsea - Welcome back Rafa Benitez... Fuck Off Chelsea.

Who would have thought when Rafael Benitez left his job as Liverpool manager in 2010 that when he returned, in a professional capacity at least, that he would do so in charge of Chelsea. Well I say 'in charge' in the loosest possible sense.

The 'I want that one' child-like mentality of the Chelsea's oligarch means that that whoever is in charge won't be for very long and they've even given up the pretence of this by calling Benitez the 'interim' manager which
is setting him up to fail. You cannot really manage a football club, or anything else for that matter if you don't have the authority over those that you are trying to manage. Particularly when you've got insufferable pricks like John Terry about the place.

I didn't really want this to turn into a Chelsea rant, but I suppose that's inevitable.

Benitez was living on borrowed time from day one.. to have a stadium booing you before you've even kicked off your first game cannot have been easy, even if it is only Chelsea fans doing it. It is curious how it's never 'Abramovic Out' that they're are whining about is it. He is clearly the common factor in their revolving door manager recruitment strategy.

It is a strange one today.. not least because the Chelsea manager is held in much higher regard by the Liverpool fans than his own. It's hard to think of the equivalent really. Perhaps it would be if Mourinho rocked up at Anfield, although I'm not sure that quite fits. Largely because of the careers of the two men since they left Chelsea and Liverpool respectably. Highlighted by the fortunes of both men at Inter Milan. Mourinho winning the Champions League there has to rank about as high as Benitez winning it with us.

I didn't like the self-proclaimed 'special one' when he was at Chelsea - this won't come as much of a shock - but, when you look at his career since and indeed while he was at Porto I have to admit a grudging respect for his achievements. A point brought into sharp focus when you consider who will take over at Man United when Ferguson finally leaves - although you suspect that might be in a box.

Back to today. Liverpool are now into the customary April 'dead' league games.. this is something that needs to be rectified very quickly. By this time next season we need the last few league games to have significance. Now I'm not deluded enough to think that this would mean a challenge for the league (We haven't the strength in depth of squad just yet), but we certainly need to get towards the pointy end in terms of fighting for the top 4 places... because if not we can wave goodbye to Luis Suarez.

At the pointy end of the fight for the top 4 is where we find our visitors today and personally I would love it if we could kick a large hole in their chances today. Chelsea have gradually risen in my levels of contempt  over the past few years. They are a club with very few, if any, redeeming features and they represent an awful lot of what is wrong with modern football. They represent this and also they are the cause of a lot of it as well. And when I say Chelsea I do mean specifically Roman Abramovich.

Nothing to see here.

Chelsea are where they are today on the whim of a deeply suspicious character. Not wanting to make sweeping generalisations (standby for a sweeping generalisation) but you don't get that rich in Russia (or anywhere else) by operating within the margins of what is legal.. allegedly. That's how it works isn't it, just say allegedly at the end and you can make any old shit up.

Now the story goes that Abramovich originally intended to buy Tottenham but saw Stamford Bridge from his helicopter and changed his mind. Now I'm not sure how that true that story is, but it does't sound very far off the mark.

And once he started throwing his money around it was up to everyone else to try and follow suit.. a course of events that nearly destroyed Liverpool when we went cap in hand to Hicks & Gillett. And of course you now have the likes of Man City spending eye-watering sums of money which who cannot generate through football. A point summed up by Arsene Wenger when he said that the success of a football club should be built on sweat, not oil.

Aren't I doing well not turning this into a Chelsea rant?

Back to today's game.. hopefully a repeat of the 4-1 demolition of Chelsea last season awaits us this afternoon, but that is perhaps a bit optimistic. The goals do seem to have dried up a little over the past two games. But quite how that happened against Reading was thanks almost entirely to the almost super-human efforts of Alex McCarthy in goal.

But Chelsea's away form is a bit ragged.. the win at Fulham was their first away win in the League since their Jon Walters assisted battering of Stoke in January - with only a point picked up from 4 away games at Reading, Southampton, Newcastle and Man City. Not really the form of a convincing top 4 push.

As far as Liverpool are concerned.. well it depends which Liverpool turns up. We have had plenty of games this season where we've been scoring goals for fun, but we have also had several where frankly we just haven't turned up. Inconsistency is one of the major wrinkles the Rodgers is going to have to iron out for next season.

But hopefully we do turn up today.. we don't particularly need the points any more, but if it fucks Chelsea up then that's good enough for me, particularly as the only redeemable feature of that 'football club' won't be around next season anyway.