The first game I remember from the 2004-05 season was the second leg of the Champions League qualifier against Graz. My memory is of the Anfield crowd gasping in unison at how slow Rafa’s first signing, Josemi, was. We lost that game one nil but went through on away goals. I was straight on to my mate Chops after the game, for a bitch. Patience was needed. I went on holiday to Mallorca. On the bus transfer from airport to hotel, I saw some kind of a work van with R. Benitez on the side of it. It’s probably a very popular name but looking back and the fact that I still remember it so clearly, I took it as a sign, though I claim no prescience. I was excited about Rafa. It was between him and Alan Curbishley who’d been doing well at Charlton. Thankfully David Moores and Rick Parry went for the man who’d won La Liga twice with Valencia and the Uefa Cup. Valencia had given Liverpool a lesson in the Champions League in 02-03. Perhaps that was the catalyst for this move. Benitez was dealt a blow early in his reign when Michael Owen decided to leave for Real Madrid. This was a player who was being talked about as the first £100m footballer. He left for a measly 8m with Antonio Nunez thrown in as part of the deal. Owen was another stunning player for us. Only two Premier League players have won the Ballon D'Or, Owen in 2001 and Cristiano Ronaldo in 2008. Liverpool's number 10 was lethal in front of goal for club and country the year he won it. The injuries were becoming a little more frequent and it would take him a while to get going once he returned but then he'd go on long scoring runs. He was like a fighter pilot. A ball would be played in behind a defence and Owen would move onto it in a flash. He'd lock on to the target, pull the trigger and fire the ball into whatever corner he'd aimed at. What we know now is that we'd already seen the best of him and it was his own decision to leave. A lot of Liverpool fans can't forgive him for leaving and then going to United but I bear no ill will. I loved him when he played for us and he played a huge part in the treble season. We share the same birthday. Me, Michael Owen and Chris Waddle and I think of myself as a footballer being a mixture of them. Small, skilful, two footed and I had a bit of a mullet at one time.
Rafa was clinical in his approach to players and if Owen didn't want to play for him then he could go. The money was used to fund new recruits. Xabi Alonso looked a brilliant buy and Luis Garcia could do a job. Carragher replaced Henchoz at centre back alongside Sami Hyypia. Cisse had been signed by Houllier but looked very raw and not a great finisher. He seemed to hit the ball at the keeper and hope for the best. Not sure if he saw a gap between their legs or thought he could thread the ball through the eye of a needle and into the net it’s hard to know but he just didn’t look very good, certainly not in the Thierry Henry mould. Cisse was also caught offside a lot and I remember talking to someone on a film set about him once who thought he was unlucky because he was always part in line with the last defender and given as just off. I’ve learned if you’re having to make excuses for people then there’s something wrong. He got injured early in his Liverpool career but he came back for the most important part of Liverpools recent history. 2004-05 was all about the road to Istanbul and it caught fire when Stevie Gerrard drilled in a beautiful half volley to turn a one nil deficit into a 3-1 victory over Olympiakos. Lift off. This was the season when Gerrard bloomed into the talisman of Liverpool Football Club. Captain Fantastic. He missed some games as well. Juventus away in the quarter final having won the first leg 2-1 at home, featured the much maligned Igor Biscan instead of an injured Gerrard. This was the quintessential European away performance. Liverpool somehow came away with a nil nil draw to progress to the semis and face the nouveau riche, Chelsea.
A new rivalry had begun. A new barrier to winning the league. Roman Abramovich had bought the football club in probably the richest area of England and lavished upon it riches beyond their wildest dreams. Claudio Ranieri was his first managerial appointment but despite heavy investment in players he didn’t win them anything so was replaced with the hottest manager in football, Jose Mourinho. The Special One arrived with all the arrogance and bravado of a man who had won everything in Portugal and indeed Europe in the previous two seasons. He was ready to spread his wings and having been a translator for Bobby Robson at Barcelona, he already spoke excellent English to go along with his undoubted coaching ability. Mourinho quickly turned Chelsea into a relentless machine - Cech in goal, Terry and Carvalho at centre back, Makelele and Lampard in midfield with Duff, Robben and Drogba up front. Not only did they have the best 11 in English football they had the best bench as well with the likes of Kezman, Geremi, Joe Cole, Thiago, Gudjohnsen, Glen Johnson, Scott Parker, Wayne Bridge, Smertin and Ferreira. Football was changing. Money talked now more than ever. Gone were the days when you had to build an all conquering team. This was the beginning of the era of buying one. Jack Walker and Blackburn had done it in the mid 90’s but not on this scale. I remember laughing at the news that Blackburn were trying to buy Gary Lineker from Grampus 8 in Japan. Lineker was still a big name but who the hell were Blackburn? It wouldn’t be long until everyone knew them and I even met a Blackburn fan at university who admitted he’d only started following them during the transformation under Jack Walker. Chelsea though were operating on a different level. It seemed they could buy anyone they wanted for what ever they had to pay. Until that point Chelsea were a team who Liverpool had beaten in 1986 to win the league when Kenny Dalglish scored one of my favourite ever goals. They were also the club my cousins in Chiswick and Battersea supported. They were almost another one of my second teams because they were no threat to us (I loosely followed a team in each of the other divisions of English and Scottish football - Wolves, Bolton, Wrexham, Celtic, Ayr, Stenhousemuir and my local team Newry Town in the Irish League and Dundalk in the League of Ireland). That changed a bit in 1997 when Ken Bates club beat us in the FA Cup under Gianluca Vialli but still they weren’t at our level as we tried to hunt down United and then Arsenal. We hadn’t managed to do that and now there was another fly in the ointment. Chelsea had drawn first blood in this new battle for dominance when they won the League Cup. Steven Gerrard headed in a late own goal to send the game into extra time, Chelsea's stronger squad scored two more and won the game 3-2. They were well on the way to taking our most coveted prize but now they were also taking our old reliable league cup trophy too. Mourinho shushed the Liverpool fans but that would come back to haunt him within a few months. Like Turin, Benitez and his team put on a masterclass of European away football by getting the nil nil draw at Stamford Bridge to set it up for an unbelievable night at Anfield a week later. These games are why we support Liverpool. These games provide the answer to why football is such an addiction. The joy, pain, drama, disbelief, excruciating fear and ultimately the release, the relief and celebration of winning a big football match like that was there to be seen and heard at Anfield that night. The best thing was there was still the final as well.
I wrote my Istanbul story so many years ago it was on Myspace (by the state of this, it may have been written in the hours after the final!):
I've grown up watching Liverpool on telly. That's what I'm used to so the thought of actually going to Istanbul hardly crossed my mind. I'd lived in Belfast for 6 years so i know it quite well and I have a friend and fellow red who lives up there. he is a Doctor of Psychology and works in Queens University. His office is right across the road from The Bot (botanic Inn) which is far and a way the most popular bar in the student area.We'd watched the UEFA cup final there and various games leading up to it, most memorably Barca at home (McAllisters penalty won it). His name is Chops.
Chops'd been there from 4.30 pm and he informed me on the phone that the
place was already chocca. I posted on a forum wishing everyone Good Luck
watching it as I expected Liverpool to put us through the mill as ever. One
of the last things i wrote was "...and if it goes to extra time and penalties
hang onto your trunks" having no idea what eventually would lead to the game going to extra time and penalties. I got picked up by another mate The Lawn Ranger, he's a gardener, we discussed the likelihood of what would happen, both convinced Liverpool would win but we didn't know
how. My other close Liverpool compadre is now in Australia so I'd been
texting him in anticipation while listening to 5 live cos the CD player
wouldn't work.
Got to Belfast at about 6.30pm, traffic was bad and it was raining. parking
was at a premium so we parked in the Queens Campus, in danger of being
clamped. We got into the Bot which was awash with reds, the beatles were on and everybody was pumped. We met up with Chops, he'd got seats right in
front of the big screen, i got the drinks in and we were set.
An hour to kick off, something was troubling the Lawn Ranger. He was hungry and in fear of getting clamped. He decided to leave and get something to eat and park the car somewhere else. we let him go forgetting that you could get grub in the bar. I had a few jars with Chops and had the craic, drinking quite fast because of the nerves. Just after 7 my phone went, it was the Lawn Ranger he couldn't get back in. I went out to plead with the door men, never the most accommodating people, they wouldn't have any of it. There was a big queue now outside, I told the Lawn Ranger to queue for a bit see if he gets in. I went back into the bar and the singing was in full effect. I didn't want to leave! I left it 10 minutes then went back out to see his progress, he hadn't moved. I begged the bouncers again, they were gonna fire me out too. Fucking arseholes.
I told the Lawn Ranger to head across the road to the Egg (eglantine inn)
and I went in and told Chops the situation. We cursed the Lawn ranger up and
down as we struggled to hear ourselves over the tremendous noise the
Liverpool fans were making. I told Chops to stay there as he was with
colleagues and he had worked hard to keep his prime seats. I told him I'd
meet him afterwards and I left giving the bouncers some shit as I went.
Part 2
The Eg was dead compared to the Bot which was jumping. I was already fairly wired at this stage so I just walked in and started singing. We stood just inside the door: "Rafa Rafa Benitez, Rafa Rafa Benitez, Xabi Alonso, Garcia and Nunez" and "low lie the fields of Anfield Road" nobody joined in, not even the Lawn Ranger and to make things worse there was a pocket of United fans in there acting up " manchester na na na". I got a couple of pints and the game was about to begin. I was drinking Carlsberg, whereas I usually drink Guinness, this is important for later, I couldn't afford the time of waiting for the pints to settle. So the game begins and of course we're one down in a minute and the united fans are singing. Kewell goes off, waste of fucking time harry and he brings on Smicer, "where's Dietmar?" I was shouting but I thought "well at least rafa is thinking attack minded".We were getting tanked both in the bar and in Turkey. I went to the bogs and heard on the audio in there, 2 nil down, no way back. I went to the bar on the way back. United fans singing like fuck. Fuck! this can't get any worse, wrong 3 nil just before half time. Devastation. Everybody was stunned. I text Chops "we are a team stunned". I was lamped. Somebody said something to me at the bar and I flipped, I turned around seen the United fans laughing and singing. Chops text back "They've only got us angry". I went round a load of the Liverpool fans crying in their beer and I grabbed their shirts and told them to get up " Come On !! we're Liverpool, on your feet! don't give up" (i'm getting shivers down my spine now thinking about it) I started singing again to drown out the United fans and a couple of others began to join in. I sat my drink down in a table in front of me with a group of Liverpool fans sitting there.
The second half began, I picked up my drink again and watched hoping for a
miracle. hamann was on, this to me was a good sign, I love Dietmar, i think
he is a great player and his importance to the team was apparent right from
the kick off. he kept the ball and let Stevie G bomb forward. I was cradling
my pint when the guy sitting in front started looking round like he 'd lost
something " here mate thats my pint" I looked down at the glass in my hand "no mate.....". I had, i'd lifted his Guinness and had drank half of it, a
drunken reflex, since I nearly always drink Guinness. " sorry I'll buy you
another". He was calm but pissed off , his team were getting beat and some
drunken idiot who'd been singing on his own had lifted his pint. he got up
to go to the toilet. Riise crosses for Gerrard who loops a header that took
an age to drop into the net. The bar erupted. The guy getting up off his
seat was replaced by the Guinness I'd just stolen from him. "Yes!! Yes!!" we
jumped up and down together "aw mate I spilled a pint on your seat" I
pleaded " fuck it" he said "I dont care, we're back in it, get the fucking
songs going". So I did. I lifted the seat, covered in Guinness and I
wouldn't let anybody sit on it, not that anybody would have sat on the
soaking thing. I stood up on it and started singing " You'll never walk
alone" and everybody sang along, i turned round to the United fans and
laughed. I knew that we'd done the hardest thing, scoring the next goal.
Come on!
Liverpool on top, ball played across the field arrives at the feet of Vlad
the impaler "hit it Vladi, you owe us". He does, it goes through a couple of
defenders and Dida can't reach it. 3-2 unbelievable! Euphoria in the bar,
hugging everyone. Wait! we're not finished Gerrard breaks through, pulled
down, "Penalty! Yes!!". Xabi steps up, good choice, he'll score. He
misses.........but smashes in the rebound. 3 all. Who'd have thunk it. After
that the game for me is a blur I'm smashed, shattered, watching and
understanding that we have to hang on for the guts of an hour and try to
nick one at any opportunity. The only thing I remember is sheer desperation,
Traore clearing one, Carragher last ditch tackles, Gerrard at right back and
Dudek unbeatable. We had a song from the 2003 Carling Cup Final against Man U when Dudek was outstanding " Dudek is our hero hey hey Dudek is our hero" to the tune of Dude looks like a lady by Aerosmith. Every time he makes a save the bar is singing our song and then he pulls off that double save from Shevchenks and you just know, you just know that they can't win and we just have to take it from them. Still nobody is allowed to touch the chair. Elation and confusion everywhere, the united fans long since exited the bar. It was ours we just had to win the shoot out.
I couldn't remember the shoot out as a whole, just Serginho missing, smicer,
Hamann and Cisse scoring. I couldn't remember the Dudek shuffle and had to
be told the game was over. I hugged people all around me, the best football
night of my life and i shared it with the Lawn Ranger and a load of people I
wouldn't know if I seen again. I tried to get the chair out on the street as
people spilled out of both bars and filed into conga lines up and down the
road. Eventually meeting Chops among the throng of supporters going
ballistic. We went to this office for a couple of beers and to gather our
thoughts. We moved onto another bar then went back to Chops house and watched it again and again and again…….
Yikes. This is why I don't drink anymore.
For 2 days after that I was at Ulster Television Studios in Belfast editing a short documentary about a boxing club in the city. Every time I walked through reception there were replays of Dudek saving from Shevchenko and the little pixie, Pirlo. I went out at lunch time to get a Liverpool shirt with 5 on the back but I never bought it and that would be a regret of mine for many years as that 2005 shirt proved very difficult to get anywhere. I stayed with Chops and his wife Fiona in Belfast for those 2 days and the news was just full of the final and the homecoming for 48 hours. Another season DVD was bought and watched over and over to pinpoint the moments that led to the greatest football night of my life. There is evidence of a correlation between the success of the Republic Of Ireland national team in the late 80’s and early 90’s and the Celtic Tiger. My life improved dramatically on the back of Liverpool winning the champions league in 2005. I think I finally started to grow up. I was attempting things like filmmaking I’d always wanted to do but never had the balls. This was also the year my future sister in law married a man from Sunderland and the year I started going out with my future wife who I’d bumped into again at an Ian Brown concert in Belfast. It was not long after the death of George Best and the whole audience was singing “We all live in Georgie Best world” along with the United fan on stage.
Unexpected Champions League in the bag, could we now go on and win the league? Well, it looked like any attempt would be made without Steven Gerrard who had agreed to join Chelsea following a lot of dithering over a new contract by Chief Executive Rick Parry and Liverpool. Parry’s name would come up time and time again over the next 5 years. The day Gerrard “joined” Chelsea I met my uncle Jimmy driving the bus I was taking home and I just said “what about Stevie, the fucker?”. He probably said something sensible like “well, it didn’t work out too well for Owen when he left us”. Which was true. Owen was being sold after just one season in Madrid and to add insult to injury we bought Peter Crouch instead of bringing MO back. Gerrard didn’t join Chelsea in the end. There were some unsavoury scenes of Liverpool fans burning Gerrard jerseys, the usual sensationalist rubbish broadcast by the 24 hour Sky Sports News. The decision to stay was a huge boost to the club but the challenge now was could Liverpool match the ambition of Gerrard who could have gone to Chelsea and won everything in football. A more urgent issue was that UEFA had not made any provision for the winners of the tournament qualifying for champions league football if they finished outside the top 4. Liverpool finished 5th behind Everton and had to start their campaign at the first qualifying round in mid July. Rafa made some important signings that summer. Alongside the signing of Crouch, who had been recommended to the manager by Carragher and Hyypia as the opposition forward who had given them the most trouble the previous season, Pepe Reina was signed to replace Dudek who despite his heroics in Istanbul was still guilty of too many mistakes. Ex Chelsea man Bolo Zenden came in from Middlesboro and Momo Sissoko was brought in from Benitez’s old team Valencia. Baros, Smicer and Biscan left as Rafa continued to build his own team. Fernando Morientes had been signed the previous January though was cup tied for Europe. Liverpool eventually qualified for the group stages were Chelsea again waited for them. The 2 games against the London side were typical of the other European games between the two clubs. My only memory of them is a horrendous leg breaking challenge from Michael Essien on Didi Hamann only for Dietmar to get up and play on. Up yours, Essien. Liverpool had lost 4-1 to champions Chelsea early in the premier league season as Gerrard was given a reminder of what he was missing out on but Liverpools league form improved after that and they won all their games for the next 3 months. Peter Crouch endured a tough start to his Liverpool career but finally got off the mark in December at home to Wigan and eventually the goals started to flow as did his song - “he’s big, he’s red, his feet stick out the bed, he’s Peter Crouch, Peter Crouch”. It was his all round game and assists that made him an important part of the team and the fans appreciated that. Robbie Fowler returned in January to bolster the attacking ranks as Liverpool continued to fight on all fronts. Daniel Agger was signed too. Fowler had been sold to moneybags Leeds by Gerard Houllier at the end of 2001. Like Owen, Fowler had endured a lot of injuries and he'd had his best days at Liverpool but it was great to see him back in a red shirt and he still had a nose for goals. The new Leeds era was built on foundations of sand and it soon crumbled when they missed out on Champions League football. They are still recovering from that. The defence of the Champions League was over in the round of 16 after Christmas when we lost to Benfica home and away. Simao, who had been strongly linked with a move to Liverpool the previous summer, scored a screamer for the Portuguese. The league was looking like Chelsea’s again but the battle for top 4 continued and the FA Cup was looking like a definite possibility when United were beaten 1 nil at Anfield in the fifth round in another typically tight game. Crouch with a header that hit the post and rolled right across the line before it went in. The quarter final was anything but tight as Liverpool hammered Birmingham 7 (seven) nil at St. Andrews to set up a semi final with yes you guessed it, Chelsea, at Old Trafford. Riise scored a free kick mid way through the first half and Luis Garcia scored a brilliant second to put us 2 nil ahead. I was watching this in a bar with TV’s on the ceiling which was something that thankfully never caught on. Drogba pounced on a mistake to make it a nervy last 20 minutes but we held on to reach another final in another competition.
The final should have been a formality against a struggling West Ham side who had Alan Pardew managing them to bring back memories of that shock semi final defeat against Palace in 1990. All sense went out the window when West Ham went 2 nil up in the first half hour. Gerrard though proved in that game why he was one of the best players in the world, just like he had 12 months earlier. He played a brilliant 30 yard ball over the west ham defence for Cisse to volley in from the penalty spot. In the second half he smashed a Crouch knock down into the roof of the net. I was watching this in the beautiful fishing village of Carlingford just over the border from my home town, Newry in the north. There was a big crowd watching in the outside beer garden on a beautiful sunny day. At that point, it looked like Liverpool would go on and win easily but cometh the hour, cometh the hurt as yet again Liverpool took the scenic route. Koncheskys cross looped over Reina who wasn’t having a great day having already been at fault for the second goal. Again, the United fans in the bar were gloating at our impending defeat until Steven Gerrard scored probably the best FA Cup final goal ever. With the stadium announcer telling West Ham fans they would win the FA Cup in 4 minutes if they could hang on, the ball bounced out to Gerrard 35 yards out. This time he hit the ball first time, straight through the Hammers defence, the ball zooming at about a foot off the ground all the way into the right hand side of Shaka Hislop’s net. Unbelievable goal made all the more special by the fact it was a last minute equaliser in the FA Cup final. Reina made amends in the shoot out, saving 3 penalties to win the cup for Liverpool. One thing I remember from this final, having bought the season DVD and watched it a hundred times, does Stevie Gerrard not know that the lid of the FA Cup comes off? He’d won it before so he must’ve but maybe the exertions of the day took their toll and when he lifted it and shook it above his head the lid fell down behind. Not sure anyone other than me noticed or cared. In the bar, the Liverpool fans taunted the United supporting friends that the league was next. That old accusation from United fans that “next year” would be “our year”. One of my United supporting mates, (I should say his name is Kenny as he has figured in this series a lot) tried to derail the celebrations and ambitions by stating we couldn’t even beat West Ham!
2006-07 season started with more of the heroes from the road to Istanbul departing. Hamann, Traore, Sinama-Pongolle and Mellor, amongst others were sold. Dani Alves was heavily linked but Kuyt, Pennant, Bellamy, Gonzalez and Aurelio arrived. Hardly signings that would make you think we could surpass Chelsea. Dirk Kuyt came with a bagful of goals from the Dutch league but he never really got going in the league in his first season. He would eventually make the right hand side his own in Rafa’s 4231 formation. I went to my first game in years that season. I took my now wife, Emma, to Liverpool for New Years Eve and we went to see Liverpool v Bolton the next day. Kuyt was excellent that day in a game marked by Steven Gerrard MBE doing a regal celebration. The league was very disappointing and soon it was only about the Champions League progress. We breezed through against PSV, Galatasary and Bordeaux to face Barcelona in the round of 16. Crucially, we had the second leg at home but it was at the Nou Camp were the game was won. Bellamy and Riise scoring the goals in a game that will be more remembered for the goal scorers coming to blows during a warm weather training break. Bellamy attacked Riise with a golf club and celebrated scoring by swinging an imaginary club. Personally, I will remember new boy Alvaro Arbeloa’s man marking job on Messi from that game. Arbeloa had arrived from Spain in January and this may have been his debut. If it was then it was one of the best ever. He played as right footed left back, ready for Messi cutting in on his left foot every time he tried. Mascherano also arrived from West Ham to complete what would go on to be the best midfield in the world. Next, PSV were brushed aside again to set up another Chelsea semi final. The first leg was at Stamford Bridge and the London club took a 1 nil lead to Anfield for the second leg. A well worked free kick saw Daniel Agger free at the edge of the box to sweep in Gerrard’s lateral pass. The rest of the game was more of the attritional fayre we had become used to. Liverpool triumphed, this time on penalties, to make another Champions League final and again it was AC Milan. The Athens final was more the game of chess that Istanbul probably should have been. It came down to a lucky deflection when a shot went in off Inzaghi's arse and a rush of blood from Reina running out wide of his goal to try and stop the Italian poacher who took the ball round him and scored from a tight angle. 1 nil at half time became 2 nil with less than 10 minutes to go. Milan were not going to let the lead slip. No heroics from Gerrard or anyone else this time. Crouch didn’t start but eventually came on and caused the trouble everyone knew he would. Kuyt scored a last minute consolation but it was too little too late. Along with the epic finals, these types of games when Rafa refused to take any risks would define his reign. The manager bemoaned the lack of investment in players, testing the commitment of new owners Hicks and Gillett who were supposed to be the people to allow Liverpool to seriously compete with Chelsea and United. The Red Devils had won the league again for the first time since 2003. Rafa told the gathered post final media that there was a player Liverpool could get who would start this process but they had to move now. His armband said he was a red, you’ll never walk alone it said.
Fernando Torres signing seemed to drag on for a very long time that summer but that’s probably just because I was on a Liverpool forum all day, every day, at work. The deal was eventually done when the summer window opened and I waited to see if he was as good as they said. He was. He struck up an instant rapport with Gerrard. The captain now finally had an attacking asset to bring his game to another level. On day 1, Gerrard scored the winner against Villa from a brilliant free kick. Torres marked his Anfield debut with a lovely finish after a defence splitting pass from Gerrard. I always thought we won this game but Lampard got Chelsea a point from the spot. Liverpool and Benitez suffered a big blow when Assistant Manager Pako Aysteran left. He had worked with Benitez for 11 years and it’s hard to argue that Rafa lost something when he left. The first rumbles of trouble between owners and manager came that November when Hicks told Rafa to keep quiet about the January transfer window and focus on training and coaching the team. Rafa would repeat this 15 times in a press conference. It later emerged that the owners tried to replace the spaniard with Jurgen Klinsmann which led to fans marching and protesting in support of their Champions League winning manager. Liverpool went unbeaten in the league until December that year but the problem was we drew almost as many games as we won. We’ve learned over the years that unbeaten runs are well and good but it’s long winning runs that win leagues. Liverpool only lost 4 games all season but drew 13 and finished fourth. Again, the Champions League became the priority. We didn’t win a group game until match day 4 when we beat Besiktas 8-0. Peter Crouch scored a flying scissors kick. Liverpool went on to beat Porto and Marseille in the final 2 games to qualify. In January, Emma and I went to Australia for a year of travelling, stopping off in Thailand for two weeks, I watched a couple of games while I was there - Luton in the FA Cup when Alonso scored from his own half again sticks in the memory. Being down under means you’re anywhere between 8 and 12 hours ahead of the UK depending on what part you’re in at what part of the year. I was in western Australia for the end of the 07-08 season and I remember clearly getting up at 3.30am to watch both legs of Liverpool v Inter in the last 16. Bring on your Internazionale. Kuyt and Gerrard scored twice in the last five minutes to secure victory over the Italians who had Materazzi sent off in the first half. Torres finished the job at the San Siro. That set up an all Premier League quarter final between Liverpool and Arsenal. The reds came away from the Emirates with a one all draw and were favourites to go through in the second leg. Cue another crazy European night at Anfield. Arsenal took the lead. Hyypia and Torres put Liverpool ahead. Adebayor scored with six minutes left to put Arsenal through after Walcott ran the length of the pitch to set him up but super sub Ryan Babel was fouled two minutes later to allow Gerrard to score from the spot. Babel finished the job in injury time. Fantastic game of football. Well worth getting up in the middle of the night for. Liverpool were in the semi finals for the third time in four years against guess who. Chelsea of course. This time the second leg was at Stamford Bridge. The first leg was typically tight even though the Mourinho era was over. He’d been sacked and replaced by Avram Grant. Liverpool looked to have had secured a one nil home victory but deep into injury time Riise inexplicably went with his head instead of his right and headed an attempted clearance into his own net. This game was shown on aussie tv at 3.30 and then again at 6am. I got up later to watch but met my Liverpool supporting flat mate on his way back to bed from watching it live. He didn’t say anything. Probably as stunned as I was two hours later. The second leg was tight again. Chelsea took the lead through Drogba but Torres finished from Benayoun’s pass to send the game into extra time but Lampard and Drogba scored to end Liverpools hopes of facing Man Utd in Moscow. I had been worried about where I was going to watch the final as we headed up the west coast of Australia in a campervan with a map and a rough idea of where we were going and for how long. I didn't need to worry any more. The radio in the old van only worked some times but I clearly remember driving somewhere between Broome and Darwin and hearing that United had won and being glad I hadn’t seen it. Disappointing end to the season but Champions League qualification had again been achieved while Torres and Gerrard had scored over 50 goals between them in their first season playing together. Things were looking very promising.
That summer as Jordan Henderson was signing his first professional contract with Sunderland, Rafa Benitez was trying to sell Xabi Alonso. The manager was angry that Alonso chose to attend the birth of his child rather than play for Liverpool against Inter Milan. The best midfield in the world was in danger of being broken up before it got a chance to show what it could do. Benitez tried to sign Gareth Barry to replace Alonso who he wanted to sell to Juventus. Barry never arrived and Alonso stayed though he would not forget how Benitez had treated him. The signing of Robbie Keane raised the most eyebrows as no one knew exactly where he would play considering Gerrard was playing in the role that would most suit the Irishman. Keane would be bombed out again by Christmas as the wheels started to come off the Benitez bus. Gillett and Hicks were not what they promised. The financial crash of 2007-08 had put the new stadium costs up considerably and the two owners were hardly even talking to each other. The 08-09 season started well winning 8 of the first 10 including victories at Everton (on AFL Grand Final Day), Chelsea and at home to United. A last minute winner against a Man City team who had some money behind them but still had not been bought by Abu Dhabi, prompted Emma to cut out a newspaper report of the game and stick to the outside of our beautiful, tiny, apartment in Melbourne “Title Challenge? Take It As Red”. However, we were still beset by the same problems. In the first half of the season we had nil nil draws against Villa, Stoke (who were a pain in the arse under Tony Pulis), Fulham and West Ham. Three of those draws were at home. I remember the West Ham one clearly as I watched it in a casino at 6 in the morning then went to work doing payroll for Victoria Police. It was one of those games when we just didn’t do enough or take enough risks to try and win the game. Another game I clearly remember was the 2-2 draw at home with Hull, I avoided the score and went over to watch it at the home of Emma's friend from work who was studying to be a masseuse. I watched the game with her husband and Emma got a massage. We were 2 nil down but came back to level the game before half time. Surely we would go on and win it in the second half. We should have but we didn’t. Torres was injured. Keane was left on the bench and unbelievably there was talk of him being sold already. I wasn’t having any of that, surely it wasn’t true. That would be worse than a substitute being substituted. We managed to stay top at Christmas but United had games in hand from being away playing in the World Club Championship. We beat Newcastle 5-1 after Christmas but then Gerrard was involved in a bit of fisticuffs with a DJ somewhere - an unwanted distraction. The biggest problem came when Rafa decided to go to war with Fergie in a pre-game presser when he produced a list of what he claimed were facts about how the United manager had got preferential treatment. Unfortunately, it didn’t have the rallying effect Liverpool fans hoped for and we had to settle for a nil nil draw with horrible Stoke. We went to Sydney for Christmas and New Year. A friend of mine from Irish summer school in Donegal was living in McMahon Point which had a great view for the Harbour Bridge on NYE. It was a very busy time for her as she was also getting married. To an actuary. When I heard him talking about United in winning 1 nil mode, I knew he'd done his sums and it wasn't looking good for us ending a 19 year wait for the title. We drew the next two games as well and the writing looked to be on the wall. Around that time, Jordan Henderson joined Coventry on loan. Liverpool won 12 of their final 15 games including wins over Chelsea and United but it wasn’t enough. Draws had done for us again. In the Champions League, Real Madrid were defeated home and away in the last 16. Chelsea were waiting in the next round, again the second leg was at the Bridge but this time the blues didn’t need any own goals. They won the first leg at Anfield 3-1 despite Torres giving us the lead. The second leg was a rollercoaster that had Liverpool going through at one stage but ultimately ended 4-4. Probably our most disappointing season as that team was one of my favourites. Reina in goal, Arbeloa right back, Carragher and Skrtel or Agger, Aurelio left back, Alonso and Mascherano in midfield, Kuyt on the right, Gerrard behind Torres and Riera on the left was our best 11 but Torres injury before Christmas exposed our lack of strength in depth. Keane could have been the answer if Rafa had shown any belief in him but it was clear the pair didn’t hit it off and Keane was sold less than 6 months after joining. Alonso would leave in the summer of 2009. The best midfield in the world was over, having won nothing together. For all the great performances and long Champions League campaigns the fact that team had nothing to show for their efforts and the subsequent break up of that team over the next few windows shows you can only keep good players for so long without winning major trophies. That 2008-09 team was better than the 2005 and 2006 cup winning teams but then again Rafa only really went after the league and champions league. He knew how much Liverpool wanted to win the league again but he also knew the money was in the Champions League. FA Cups and League Cups were fine but finishing fourth was better than both of those.
Comments
Post a Comment