I've had just about enough of Luis Suarez now.

The increasingly complicated transfer merry-go-round is grinding into gear. And once again, seemingly controlling this half-arsed machinery is Real Madrid. Well I suppose 'controlling' is something of a strong term for what they seem to be doing, but it is what it is.

Basically everyone wants a new striker. Liverpool haven't been doing well enough to keep their best one so

Maybe we need some kind of gag. 

everyone else wants to sign him, despite his bitey tendencies. 

Well, by everyone else this seems to be Real Madrid and Arsenal, but there's no doubt a few others in the fray who for some reason don't want to conduct transfer negotiations on the back pages of newspapers, like it must be said a certain Mr Suarez seems to be keen on.

For someone with such a stated issue with the media, he does seem to spend an awful lot of time talking to them.

Arsenal seem to gathering their pennies together for a £40m bid for Suarez, which triggers some kind of clause in his contract. Presumably along the lines of us having to tell him about it and him the having to put in a transfer request if he wants to actually go. Which will also cost him money if he does indeed go, if he walks out of the door rather than being pushed.

Now this could all work in our favour IF Real Madrid do actually want to sign Suarez. Nothing like a bidding war to ramp the price up a bit. If we can get up to £50m for him then this would be a decent amount to play with, certainly in terms of getting a replacement or two.

Whether Arsenal are serious about Suarez and if they are just trying to force Madrid's hand over their proposed signing of Higuain remains to be seen. It may even piss Madrid off completely and they won't want to do business with them at all.


Personally I can't see Suarez being happy wth a move to Arsenal. Granted, he seems to be burning his bridges at Anfield reasonably effectively every time he opens his mouth, but it's hardly a massive step up in class. 

Reaching the Champions League Quarter-Final and going out the moment you face anyone half-decent is hardly the stuff that dreams are made of. Even if they do sign Suarez they will still have Per Mertesacker in defence. An interesting coincidence, but Mertesacker is actually German for wardrobe *.

* I'm not sure if this is a fact, but I am just going to assume that it is.

Enough of Arsenal. How does this all affect Liverpool?

Well, we seem to bringing a squad together and hopefully not too recklessly any more. 

We need rid of Suarez sooner rather than later. Incredible that I should be saying this, but his attitude since the end of the season stinks and we do not need that around the club coming into a new season. 

We need him out - preferably out of the country - quickly. Possibly to Real Madrid, and if they want to send us Higuain as part of the deal to piss Arsenal off, well it wouldn't be the worst idea in the world. But with more cash than the Higuain plus £10m rumblings I heard.

Real Madrid's increasing valuation of Higuain leads me to think that this may be what they are angling for and it would have the added bonus of us getting a decent replacement striker out of it as well.

It is still only July - and you never know. The grim realisation that he might actually have to go and play for Arsenal might bring a grovelling apology from Suarez for his actions over the summer and he may stay at Liverpool after all.

Frankly though, I think it would be better all round if we just get rid.

Luis Suarez... making it up as he goes along.

I read today, with some amusement that Arsenal are still sniffing round Luis Suarez.. and whilst you cannot believe everything you read, or in the instance of the British press (especially regarding transfer rumours) anything you read, the story seems to be rumbling on.

Take for instance this from the Independent (click here for link)

Now it seems a little curious for them to describe this £30m bid as being welcomed by Suarez when the only actual quote from Suarez relating to this in the article is  "clubs are still assessing players on their ability which means I could go back and do things well over there"

Rather flimsy grasp of the the words "welcomes bid" and you don't usually get such nonsense from The Independent, but that's not really the point.

The facts are as follows. Luis Suarez has stated previously that he wants to leave Liverpool, not because he wants to leave the club as such, but it is all the fault of the British press. Now amongst Liverpool fans this is keeping it as much on safe ground as you can, whilst still saying you want to leave the club.

However, and I may be being a bit naive here, but he hasn't referred back to his previous comments when being asked about the Arsenal bid. If his actual reason for leaving was that he wanted to leave England, then you would have thought he would have said something along those lines. Although I do appreciate that a player with itchy feet doesn't want to be burning any bridges, especially when he's not actually put in a transfer request as yet. Although he is still on holiday, on his tour of the radio stations of Uruguay... popular tourist attractions I'm lead to believe.

The fact remains that he wants to leave. Now these days, that seems fair enough with player power as it is. But don't just make shit up and start changing your story to suit.

I'd have much more respect for the man, if he said something along the lines of.. "I'm at a time in my career when I need Champions League football and that is something that Liverpool cannot give me at the moment."

Now it's not something we want to hear, but it would at least be true.

I suspect the Arsenal bid has more to do with their own bid for Higuain, trying to force Real Madrid's hand as is often the case in these transfer merry-go-rounds. I'm sure they'd love to sign Suarez, but there is certainly an element of cheek about the whole thing.

One of the worrying thoughts I had about this whole transfer mess concerns Luis Suarez's 10 game ban. Now he's only served 4 games of it so far, with 6 games to go into the new season. Now if Suarez cannot play for anyone until October then why would they want to buy him now?

If I were in Real Madrid's position I'm pretty sure that I wouldn't want to spend £40m on a player that cannot play until October just yet. Sign him nearer the deadline day and you save yourself a month or so in wages and you have a player with a two game ban by the end of August. 

"I've been expecting you"

Now this makes sense if you're Real Madrid, if a little risky, but what that would do is fuck our season right up. Now £40m plus is a decent chunk of change to spend on players, but you cannot do anything with it in September and we'd be back to where we were this time last year with a striker or two light. And we all know the perils of shopping in January when everyone knows you're desperate. Christ, we'll probably end up spending the £40m on Papiss Cissé.

We're not quite in the same place, as Rodgers does seem to have been doing business strengthening the squad, but it remains to be seen how strong he is making it at the moment. Attacking options like Luis Alberto and Iago Aspas may prove to be effective, especially if they click with Coutinho. But if
Suarez does leave than there will be a very big hole to fill, and unless we want to be flapping around in seventh again come next April, it needs to be filled by kick-off in August.

A New Dawn... yes, another one for #LFC.

In 7 days time, I'll be walking 54 miles in 24 hours for World Child Cancer.. This is my just giving link


In the 'odd' summer months, (It is apparently summer although for some reason the thermostat outside appears to be stuck on October) When we don't have the distraction of the World Cup or Euro's then the new season takes on more significance earlier on.

It does seem to be helping Liverpool as we do seem to be getting our business in hand earlier than usual this year. We have the usual Suarez rumblings, although we will see where we are with that when Suarez comes back from South America.

I suspect that making vague statements in press conferences thousands of miles away is easier than sitting down and being reminded that he has a contract for a good few years yet, and if you do want to leave than there are ways of going about it.

It is good that we do appear to be getting on with it regardless though.

In so far we have Kolo Toure, Luis Alberto, Iago Aspas and Simon Mignolet.

Not sure what's going on here.

I'm not going to pretend I know too much about Luis Alberto and Iago Aspas, beyond having a nosey on-line once we'd signed them, but they seem reasonable enough. And I would hope cleverer men than me have been a bit more rigorous in their research. But what their signings do give us is options.

Brendan Rodgers has in his head what he wants his team to look like.. and whilst he does seem to like teeny, tiny footballers that's not too much of a problem if you keep the balance right, or if you don't let the other side have the ball.

Seriously though... Why?

Options in attack will be vital next season. One thing that would be fatal to our season would be if Daniel Sturridge is unchallenged for his place. It seems to me that when he is comfortable then he seems to switch off in games. An angry Daniel Sturridge, fighting for his place is a significantly better player than when he isn't. You just have to see his impact off the bench against Chelsea, just before Suarez got a bit bitey.

Suarez may still be around, but not for a while and when he does come back you can imagine he'll be sulking which won't help.

The signing of Simon Mignolet means that Pepe Reina will be out of the door soon I think. Personally if I was Reina I wouldn't mind the chance of playing for Barcelona. Frankly I could play in goal for Barcelona and get away with it. One of the easier jobs in world football.

I cannot imagine the Simon Mignolet has not been briefed on his chances of playing regularly next season. In a World Cup season he needs to playing regularly. He is fighting with Thibaut Courtois for Belgium.. a very handy keeper on loan at Atletico Madrid from Chelsea.

Although dislodging Pepe Reina at Liverpool would look quite good on his CV.

Kolo Toure is probably a shrewd move as well. With the man, the legend, Jamie Carragher retiring to do battle once again, with Gary Neville, we needed experienced back-up and that's what we have in Toure. Although if he get his brother along next time, well that would be just peachy.

And we could steal the Yaya / Kolo song off City, although this does seem a distant prospect.

One thing to our advantage next season is whoever we sign, they will have Phillipe Coutinho stood next to them, so it's all gravy from here.

Luis Suarez.. Should he stay or should he go? (Part 2)

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The never ending transfer saga surrounding Luis Suarez is rumbling on.. well, I say never-ending, you suspect that it will come to an end at some point with a transfer to Real Madrid if Suarez has his way.

It would be a shame, particularly given the support he has received from the club following his various transgressions since signing from Ajax (while he was serving his first ban for biting an opponent). You can't imagine there will be too many players where you have to specify which ban for biting people you are actually talking about.

The latest rumour mill is following the usual pattern... (see my previous blog). Off to Uruguay, press conference, back-tracking / denial / more fucking nonsense.

It's pretty clear that he wants out... you tend to pick these things up when a player is constantly on about it. Although it does seem strange that Real Madrid (for once) seem relatively quiet about the prospect. When they're after player they usually let you know about it.

There are a few issues muddying the waters at the moment.

£85m... seriously?

They haven't got a manager now the self-proclaimed special one has fucked off back to Chelsea.

They are also sniffing round the Spurs Super Chimp for some kind of crazy money.. I read £85m but that
seems insane, even for Madrid.

With the financial fair play rules dribbling in, and now the Spanish government is skint Real Madrid will most likely have to find another "revenue stream". Probably  by selling some of their squad or just Tinkerbell, possibly back to Man Utd, hopefully off to Russia somewhere.

You suspect that there are quite a lot of machinations before any potential Suarez deal is done. Which could cause Liverpool all kinds of problems.. the last thing we need is £40 odd million in the bank and a closed transfer window.

Actually - scratch that- the last thing we need is to panic like last time and buy Papiss Cisse off Newcastle for £45m.

If we can get that kind of money, then we need to spend it quickly and wisely. And hopefully not £20m plus each on players from the North East.

Peter Beardsley

It's not the end of the world if Suarez leaves.. but you do wonder how effective a mardy Suarez will be next season if he hasn't managed to engineer his move.
I keep thinking back to when my world collapsed in 1987 when we sold Ian Rush to Juventus and with the money we bought John Barnes, Peter Beardsley and John Aldridge (and then got Rush back for less the next season). The modern-day equivalents (if they even exist) would do very nicely.

We all dream of a team of Carragher's

This picture doesn't really need a caption

So that's it then. Jamie Carragher will play his final game for Liverpool this Sunday... his 737th appearance
 for the club. Pretty special in todays era of agents moving players round just for the sake of their bank balances.

It is also fitting that he leaves Liverpool with the supporters not wanting him to leave.. well stop playing at least. You can be pretty sure he's still going to be around on matchdays, especially now he's working for Sky alongside the anti-Carragher.. although credit where it's due, he has done a good job for Sky despite being "a busy little cunt" at Man Utd.

It is curious that Carragher's  announcement that he would be retiring at the end of the season coincided almost exactly with his return to the first team. Personally I am surprised that he didn't have second thoughts once it seemed that he did have another season left in his legs. Maybe that was the problem, if he was finding it a struggle, although it didn't seem too apparent. Not enough of a problem for Skrtel to get much of a sniff of a game. The fact that he already had something lined up with the move to Sky probably influenced his decision also... I suspect if that wasn't there we'd still be seeing Carra next season. But getting paid a shit-load for sitting about talking about football doesn't seem too taxing does it. Even Andy fucking Townsend gets paid for that despite barely having a basic grasp of the game.

The Carragher Manifesto

My hope is that this isn't the last the Liverpool FC will see of James Lee Duncan Carragher.. and not just sat in the stands with all the other ex-Reds. Or working for the TV with all the other ex-Reds. After reading "The Carragher Manifesto" (I believe it was called something different officially but that's not important) I want that lad in charge of Liverpool Football Club.

Football autobiographies are usually achingly dull, but Carragher's is one of the best one's going which is actually mainly about football. There are interesting ones but they aren't really about football (for example : Tony Adams, Steve Claridge).

But why am I trying to sell you this book, you've probably already read it and if not you're more likely to be interested in what the Anti-Carragher (Rat-Boy, Gary Neville, the devil has many faces) has to say for himself, which he tends to do quite a lot more these days now he's got a job for Sky.

Actually in many ways they are pretty much the same, it's just that they played for different clubs and depending on your allegiance. You either love Jamie Carragher.. or well there's probably something wrong with you if not.

Whatever Jamie Carragher does or says just makes you like him more.. (whilst the exact opposite was true of Neville) whether it was scoring a penalty for Everton at Anfield, or looking at the interviewer as if he had three heads when asked whether he'd consider leaving Liverpool for a bigger club and then telling him "Who's bigger than Liverpool?"

Or on the eve of the 2nd leg of the 2005 Champions League semi-final when on a booking saying that he didn't mind getting booked and missing the final so long "as it mattered".

Or the the story of how Salif Diao confided in him that Everton we're interested in him, but he was worried about the Liverpool fans reaction. "No.. don't worry about that.. you go and sign for Everton." Please for fucks sake go and sign for Everton.

I got stuck in a bit of a loop then... sorry.

To get back to my point.. I want to see Jamie Carragher in charge of Liverpool. He eats, sleeps, and breathes football. He studies the game like not many players do and I believe would make a  great manager - a few years down the line admittedly, but he will one day.

Now this is a bit of a leap, but say 5 years down the line, perhaps more.. hopefully we haven't gone through too many managers by that point, because a high turnover is not a good sign - maybe even with him in as a coach before then. He's practically doing this already - I read that he barks orders at Andre Wisdom whilst on the bench apparently - you can bet that this isn't an isolated incident.

But can you imagine a better person to be in charge for the re-perching of Liverpool?

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.

Why European Football is shit..

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Time for a bit of a rant, this time caused by the never ending saga of european tournaments, or more specifically, why UEFA never stop making a mess of them.

I'm reasonably confident, that doesn't say Europa League.

This has more to do with the UEFA Cup, not called that anymore but that is just the start of the constant cocking about that annoys me.

For a start it goes on way too long, to the point where Alain Depardieu recently said that he didn't care if Newcastle actually won the thing, it would still be a waste of time.

I'm paraphrasing slightly, and he is fundamentally wrong. If Newcastle actually won a trophy there would be such a regional orgasm that.. well I don't want to think about such a gruesome spectacle, but happily that's unlikely to happen before we are all long dead, so we'll move on.

His main point that his side couldn't cope with the demands of playing that many games is a fair one.

So far Newcastle have played 13 games in Europe and we're still only at the Quarter Final stage - it should be pointed out that they have only won 5 of those to get as far as they have.

Part of this is due to the sheer number of teams involved. 18 of which drop into it from the European Cup (see UEFA Cup). I agree that teams who lose their qualifier should drop into it, but the 3rd place teams from the European Cup is a joke - Chelsea I am talking about you here.

It's embarrassing and it all adds to the sense that the UEFA Cup isn't worth it. This is more of a view among the English sides although this may change if a few get through to the semi's tonight.

If they were to trim a few rounds off it.. and most of all make it worth winning, a place in the Champions League group stage would be a sufficient reward for slogging your guts out round Bratislava and the Ukraine since July.

It needs trimming down and personally I would like to see them not play all the games on a Thursday as I am  not a huge fan of going to the league games on a Sunday, but that isn't going to happen.

It is part of the larger picture of what is wrong with modern football. It used to be the point of football to win trophies. That is it.

Didn't win the league? Fuck it, we won the Cup instead.

Winning a trophy used to mean a successful season. Last season Liverpool got to two Cup Finals, winning admittedly the shit one, but people (by which I mean the press) were saying that it was still a poor season EVEN IF WE  WON THE FA CUP as well, but didn't finish in the top 4.

The Holy Grail of Modern Football - "getting in the top 4 is as good as a trophy" No it isn't Fuck Off Arsene.

But the sad thing is as long as the money keeps rolling in - by getting into the "Champions" League, not by the hard way of actually being Champions (although thank fuck for that) then that counts as success these days.

But let me ask you this... When did you last see a victory parade with the board of directors waving the club's balance sheet?