Dank je: Dirk Kuyt

So farewell then, Dirk Kuyt.

Recent discussion on the future of Dirk had centred on the conflict between the heart and the head. The cerebral argument said he is too old, that he does not fit in with FSG’s oft-misquoted youth policy, that Liverpool should capitalise while he still justifies a transfer value, that his sporadic appearances last season demonstrate his abilities are devolving, that there are younger players (Sterling) who should have the opportunity to make the impact from the bench. Those with a predilection toward the sentimental pointed out that such a determined character will always have a part to play regardless of form, that a longer run in the side would revive his magic, that his experience is invaluable, that he is a big game player who scores vital goals.. It’s a conflict as old as newspaper shinpads. Not that Dirk probably wears any.

Such a paradox has often been used to summarise Dirk's ability. He is typically characterised as a player who’s machine like exertion compensates for a lack of dexterity and subtlety of touch. Indeed for someone who has spent much of his Liverpool career in a wide position, his lack of acceleration has doubtless contributed to his lack of video montage moments. But you get the impression that he not so much suffers from a lack of pace, rather a lack of space. The Anfield pitch is simply not large enough for his legs to reach full speed. It’s conceivable that if he was allowed to run down the platform at Lime Street, he would arrive at Euston in 2 hours and 14 minutes.

Let us be misty eyed then for a few paragraphs. There was a genuine sense of anticipation when he was signed by Rafa in 2006. Those unfamiliar with the Dutch league were nevertheless impressed with his goalscoring record. 71 goals in 101 appearances for Feyenoord. His cameo debut against West Ham was sensational, in fact it’s distinctly possible that the etymology of the word barnstorming can be traced back to this day. I have a memory of Dirk charging the points of a demented triangle between Konchesky (shudder), Mullins and Bowyer. The phrase ‘cult-hero in the making’ was etched on many a press-room notepad.

The hat trick against Manchester United last year was football opera. Dirk’s primal scream in front of the Kop in celebration can still be heard on a calm day. That match encapsulated all that us admirers love about the Dutchman. And those who sniff at the trio of tap-ins that day do not understand football. 3 goals of poached wonder stands up to any ‘perfect’ hat trick. To spank 3 goals in from range requires an element of hit and hope providence. To poke home 3 times into an unguarded net necessitates instinct and intelligence. Who needs Gareth Bale or Luis Suarez (Ok, maybe Liverpool do).

There is more to Dirk’s game than the cliché insists. When the ball is played to his feet around the penalty area, few players have better vision and movement for the one-two. With Luis Suarez around, this has lethal potential which suggested a future may have remained. We have seen it many times when the two have been allowed to link up. Kuyt’s ubiquity in Benitez team selections was largely due to the trust in his defensive awareness and willingness to cover. This skill is not just borne of Kuyt’s aggression, it is borne of innate tactical awareness and positional sense. Intelligence in a footballer is a premium. Heart over head? The myth does Dirk a criminal misservice.

Yet few players with such longevity on their Liverpool CV have caused so many howls of frustration. Bad passes in crucial positions, wasteful finishing. Not many players manage to provoke so much the fickle matchday twitter generation. These days, most players are legendary after a good game, scapegoats after a bad one. Dirk Kuyt has been called both during the course of a single passing move.

Kuyt’s engaging public appearances, whether in front of Sky microphones or his brilliant charity work for children with disabilities, deservedly enhance his status.  He even made an interesting football pundit. Once, before a Europa League match with Napoli, he told a rather surreal story about a police horse that had sat on his car. Jim Rosenthal asked what the dutch for ‘No’ was. “Neigh”, replied Dirk, with impeccable comic timing. Lame and contrived, yes. But loveable also.

The final decision ultimately rested with Dirk. Recent public indications hinted at his frustration with limited appearances last season. From the club’s point of view, it seemed to make no sense to sell him. Wages aside, his retail value at this stage(just a couple of million it is rumoured at the time of writing) would not seem to cover the loss of his potential contributions, even as an bit-part player from the bench. But there is the much discussed new system to think of and Rodgers has already admitted knowing which areas of the playing squad need improvement. Barring his own contribution in the Carling Cup final, Dirk would have left Liverpool without a single winners medal. No player in Liverpool history has worked so hard for so little reward in silver. It’s time to wish him well with enormous gratitude. It’s time to let the heart rule the head. Dirk deserves it.

Brendan Rodgers: The meeting of philosphies.

Here we are again. Another new dawn for a club which has had more new dawns than Jupiter. And once again, opinion is polarised. Not many of us can claim to have held Rodgers on a long term wishlist of potential leaders. A few of us have admired him from afar for his uncontested success at Swansea. Many more have been obliged to revise his history for some potential insight into what is to be expected. Already there are those who have decided he has not the credentials to succeed here. A closer look suggests he has every possible opportunity.

In the 1990s, Rodgers abandoned an unfulfilled playing career to embark on a personal crusade of education and self improvement. Some ex-players fill the void of broken dreams with self indulgence, self abuse and self-pity.  Rodgers filled the void with a thirst for knowledge and usurped  his disappointment with conviction.

Rodgers carried the memories of the great Brazilian sides around with him. Yet he found himself schooled in the curriculum of prosaic football that characterised British football education in the 80s. Tiki-taka must therefore have seemed an idyll-hard coded in another language both culturally and semantically. So his first task was to learn Spanish in order that he could communicate with those great masters of the beautiful game. Off Rodgers went on an odyssesy of pure footballing elucidation around the training grounds of Spain and Holland where the doctrines of high pressing, intelligent movement and ball distribution have been written and perfected over the decades. Zonal pressure, possession control, intelligence, movement. Continental traits maybe, but from Shankly to Rafa they found sanctuary in Liverpool too.

Rodgers' approach then clearly encompasses the technical obsession he developed on the continent. But it also encompasses hard work, preparation, fitness and determination. One of the most indicative quotes: “When I first came in I said to the players, we will push ourselves in every element of training, so it's reflective of the real game, so I don't have to go on about intensity all the time because that is an obligation”

If this is not the kind of man we want at Liverpool then it's hard to determine what is. The detractors will be sharpening their knives though. How can a man who’s greatest achievement is finishing 10^th in the league be good enough for a club for whom Champions League qualification is considered mandatory. Surely we need a proven medal winner. Arsene Wenger, Josep Guardiola, even Jurgen Klopp. None had managed the best clubs in the best leagues before. The reason they were chosen to make the step up was  their approach, their philosophy, their character. These were the things they had in common. These are the things that Rodgers preaches.

Others seek to undermine Rodgers’ association with figures such as Jose Mourinho. It didn’t work for Brian Kidd they say. Carlos Quieroz was a failure and club and international level. And fair enough, not many clubs will be clammering for Mike Phelan any time soon. But Rodgers has been more than a sidekick to an irascible Scottish autocrat. His self education and refusal to betray his principles are testament to a strength of character not seen in Ferguson’s litany of failed protégés.

The failed spell at Reading is cause for caution though there is mitigation in the lack of time he was allowed to impose his methods. If we can begin to asses Rodgers by his actions and words then it is axiomatic that it will take time for his methods to sink in. Rodgers seeks to instill a football ideology.

 Such dogmas do not begin with a chalkboard half an hour before kick off and they do not end with a chummy slap on the back on the back at full time. There are months of graft, practice, communication and coaching ahead. If it is to succeed Rodgers requires co-operation from every individual at the club. He will surely find his new players more receptive. He is taking over from a man cut from similar cloth after all.

This will doubtless be the biggest test though. For all Kenny’s genius, one criticism is that his team at times seemed to lack identity, which raises questions about whether certain players in the current squad possess the intelligence and adaptability of such an approach. Rodger’s will quickly need to assess these traits amongst his new players.

We cannot know if or how this will work out. More experienced managers have been undermined by this club before. Just ask Rafa. Others, such as Roy Hodgson never came equipped to succeed in the first place. You will doubtless hear from the usual suspects in the press that Rodgers may befall a similar fate, that fans will turn on him if success is not instantaneous. If these lazy journalists bothered to look beyond their own loyalties they would see tangible justification for the short shrift Hodgson experienced. Credit to Roy, he installed a football philosophy quicker than any of his predecessors. It was an ethos of negativity and retrogression which succeeded in uniting fans and players in their feelings of isolation and dismay. Make no mistake, Rodgers is a different class of man and a different class of manager.

Critics have condemned FSG for carrying out their managerial search in public although it is hard to find real evidence for this. There has been a perpetual thirst for knowledge fuelled only by speculation on Twitter and occasional journalistic insight. The greatest source of information was Comical Dave Whelan, a man most people last saw telling the world there was no American troops in Baghdad. In the end, the job was offered to a man who most people had written out of the running 2 weeks earlier. Privacy and professionalism are hallmarks of The Liverpool Way so at times it seemed they could do no right for doing wrong.

 Nevertheless there is work for them to do in this new order. When they arrived they promised to engage with fans yet they have allowed this relationship to deteriorate, including the communication with HJC. The stadium issue is one which threatens Liverpool's long term stability and again there is a sense of inertia and waning trust. Broken promises do not justify prolonged patience around here.

In the aftermath of Kenny’s sacking I wrote that FSG, a group of men who know nothing, sacked a man who knew everything. I stand by that principle but I recognise that FSG must stand by theirs. Many of us believe that tradition and history and culture define not just our past but also must determine our future. FSG appeared to lack sentimentality in favour of a more radical, modern, target driven approach. Rodgers suits the vision they set out when they took over. Yet he meets many of the criteria many of us want from our manager. If Brendan Rodgers is the meeting point of two radically different schools of thought then it may just result in a glorious, happy coincidence.

The Vanishing Point.

This week, one man who knows everything was sacked by a few men who know nothing.

I speak in the context of football of course. You remember football don’t you? It would be easy to forget. In parochial terms it was born in Anfield in 1892 and was crucified a century or so later in a succession of boardrooms from London to Texas. Albeit, there was a legendary resurrection in Istanbul.

Some of us retain an archaic notion that the importance of football goes beyond the tangible. That history, memories and community inform the support we have for our chosen clubs. We are normally considered weak and naïve. Of course the machinery of football has always been oiled by cash. But nowadays it is a means to an end.

Once, a simple transaction existed between supporters, players and their employers at the club. Now, the currency of this has lurched from pride to avarice. Over time, football's primary stakeholders have shifted from the terraces to the conference room, from the  pre-match pint to the post season sponsor’s meeting.

This has generated the illusion that the scope of a club's achievements can be summarised in the bottom line of a balance sheet. Hereby the importance of trophies are ranked in a hierarchy of fiscal reward. Winning one competition is deemed vastly inferior to simply qualifying for another.

When Kenny Dalglish returned to Anfield in January, it set in process an evocation of something sadly lost in the game. Some opposition fans attributed this to an outmoded sense of sentiment. But they misunderstood the faith such a figure inspires.

If 40 odd trophies as a player and manager does not adequately justify this credence, then Dalglish's leadership in the aftermath of Hillsborough surely does. It began immediately. Brian Clough was anonymous as people died on the terraces; Dalglish took to the PA system to implore calm with his familiar voice. In the weeks that followed he attended hospital bedsides, comforting parents whose children lay dying. He arranged for his players to visit grieving families, he attended memorial services from Anfield to Walton jail. He witnessed God knows how many funerals. He was visible, present, inspirational. He was a leader. In a city racked with grief, Dalglish took the burden on his own shoulders. It cost him his health and by proxy, his job. 

Liverpool's trauma in the aftermath of Hicks and Gillete may pale in comparison. But in football terms it was near catastrophic. Who else then to unite the club? There was only one. It had nothing to do with reverie or romanticism. It had everything to do with trust.

Dalglish has been accused by some of being rooted in the past. This is only true in the sense that he understands the emotional attachment that ties a club to its fans. He fought for something that is in terminal decline. For this, he paid the price.

Some imposters commented that Dalglish betrayed these principles in his defence of Luis Suarez this year. Certainly damage was caused but to whom? In his robust and aggressive stance, Kenny was engaging in the same arguments, batting away the same myths that the rest of us were at work or in the pub. He was also engaging in a form of self sacrifice, deflecting heat from his player and onto himself. Ian Ayre and the rest of the club's authority sat passively and left Kenny at the vicious, ignorant, narcissistic wrath of the media. If there is any betrayal, Kenny was the victim not the perpetrator. Suarez sadly played his part in this but senior figures at the club were the real protagonists. Ayre meanwhile maintained a hotline with the offices of Standard Chartered. It is to these pernicious jurisdictions that the club's loyalties lie now. Not us. Not Kenny.

 At no other club is the bond between manager and supporters so strong. Witness The Kop singing ‘Happy Birthday’ to Kenny, witness Rafa’s tears at the memorial service, witness Paisley’s unfailing kindness and time for young fans, witness Shankly building a footballing ideology out of his respect the people . Witness that then try to tell us that we do not know what is best for the club. Dalglish was the only man at the club to understand. Now he is gone.

Thank you Kenny Dalglish for reminding us what supporting this club means. If it is time, as is perpetually suggested to us, that we must move on to a new era in football- where we will have to learn to love our club in a different way- then thank you also for giving us the strength with which to do it. In my mind’s eye I see Kenny sailing away on the holiday he cancelled in order to return 16 months ago.  I cannot help feeling that something fundamentally special has sailed with him.

Hodgson and Dalglish. Rewriting history.

The appointment of Roy Hodgson as England manager has produced a fresh round of revisionism- particularly in relation to his time at Liverpool. The national press, preoccupied with such irrelevancies as Roy’s genial demeanour and ability to seemingly speak every language from Arabic to Zulu, are again attempting to rewrite history about the cause of Hodgson's failure. In fairness, most are underwhelmed by his appointment as England boss. The Sun, predictably, chose to mock Roy's speech impediment. Some outlets which expressed sympathy with Hodgson after he was dismissed by Liverpool now begrudgingly admit his failings. The implication is that he was good enough for Liverpool, but not for England. 
 
Foremost among the trite platitudes is the perception that Roy Hodgson’s spell at Liverpool failed because he was an unpopular choice among the Anfield fanbase. The BBC's Phil McNulty went as far as to say Hodgson failed because he was not Kenny Dalglish. Here of course, he is correct, although not in the way he intended. Discussion at the time of Hodgson’s departure inevitably referenced the possibility of a return for The King. However most intelligent debate also welcomed Manuel Pellegrini and Andre Villas-Boas. Erroneous appointments they may have proved to be, but that is not the point. It is thoroughly disingenuous to suggest that Dalglish was the only candidate in the minds of supporters and absurd to insist this was the reason Hodgson failed.   Many others in the press continue to spin similar lines of delusion by way of excusing someone they see as a reverential icon of the jumpers for goalposts era. Henry Winter claims Hodgson "faced the difficult background of so many supporters wanting Kenny Dalglish". Martin Samuel claims he was "rejected in the minds of many before the job had begun".

In reality, Hodgson failed for far more tangible reasons than his perception on Merseyside  but it  is only to fair to allude to some mitigation at this point. He was operating during the decaying months of the most pernicious administration in the club’s history. Saddled with interest repayments which were unsupportable by the club’s structure, the cancer of Hicks and Gilette had spread beyond the influence of coach and playing staff. It was terminal. Had it not been for the phenomenal application of fan power, Liverpool FC would have faced catastrophe that no messiah from Glasgow to Bethlehem could reverse.

But this can not excuse the reality of what transpired on the pitch. Liverpool fans were castigated by the likes of Paddy Barclay and Martin Samuel for their angry response to the failings of the team. Many argued that Liverpool fans had no inherent right to success, that Roy was a capable manger brought in at a difficult time to steady a ship. Yet perceived success is relative and must be contextualised. Liverpool's successes were not ringfenced to Shankly, Paisley, Fagan and Dalglish. Rafa Benitez won the Champions League with a squad worse than the one Hodgson inherited. He also achieved Liverpool’s highest ever league points total . After one poor season, he was sacked. If they acknowledge that football fans have short memories, then surely the press did not have to look far into the past to understand the nature of this discontent. From a high pressing, high tempo passing game there came stifled full backs launching aimless passes. From destroying Madrid and Man Utd, there were defeats at home to Northampton and Blackpool. From legendary stories of Sean Dundee and Bernard Diomede, Hodgson trumped them all with Paul Konchesky and Christian Poulsen. From Champions League finals there was the relegation zone.

Even that most hackneyed, most extraneous cliché of all- Roy’s nice guy status- came under scrutiny at Liverpool. He patronisingly dismissed a question from a Scandinavian journalist at a post game press conference before declaring he would never work in Norway or Denmark again. A self fulfilling prophecy, if ever there was one.

There have been silly comparisons in recent weeks which seek to equate the progress of  Dalglish’s side with Hodgson’s. Daniel Taylor in the Guardian suggested that "Dalglish's record has strayed dangerously close to being just as undistinguished" as Hodgson's. Despite the usual references to the delusion of Liverpool fans, there is not a single Liverpool fan who believes the league position is acceptable. It is a sad reality that top 4 finishes have to be aimed for. It is a commercial target rather than a barometer of achievement. But sadly, one befits the other. This should not detract from the progress that is being made. Dalglish may have been ridiculed for pointing out the progress off the field as well as the 2 cup finals his side have reached- but both points carry weight. As this weeks club finances have shown, the long term prognosis depends on the club's ability to fund a new stadium. In the meantime, 2 cup finals and some gross misfortune in the league, does not indicate a club in decline. To use another Hodgson cliche, the club is in safe hands.

Nevertheless the media continue to portray Dalglish as an irascible, defensive Scot. He has, in this regard, perhaps not helped himself this season with some confrontational post match interviews. But here the fans see what others cannot. He is a fan. One of them. His stoic defence of Luis Suarez was furiously criticised by the media- many of whom had not bothered to read the F.A. report and thereby attempt to understand Dalglish’s position. But in this defiance, the fans saw something of themselves, just as they have with all the great managers of the past. To be a Liverpool manager is to be a fan. And to be a fan, you need to know what inspires them. Anything less than that is transparent and should be treated with the contempt it deserves. Benitez may not have been cut from the same cloth as Shankly or Dalglish. But his profound understanding of Liverpool’s culture and history and his stubborn reluctance to depart from his principles, he came closer to the Liverpool way than many thought possible. His acceptance, at least among the hard core of Liverpool fans as one of the greats also poured scorn on the notion that an outsider could not fit in. Hodgson on the other hand was not blessed with such an inherent gift. Inside the club, he broke the confidence of talented players and alienated cultured individuals with retrograde training methods. Outwardly, he came across as a man who you might find lurking in a Dickensian alley, selling wincles outside a debtors gaol. Do not blame Liverpool fans for knowing what is best for their club.  

It remains true that Dalglish enjoys near immortal status with Liverpool fans. To the observer, he may also seem to benefit from a period of grace that no other manager could. Make no mistake, Dalglish earned this the hard way. He brought swashbuckling success as a player and took the team to unparallelled levels as manager. 42 trophies to those who keep count. During the aftermath of Hillsborough where he attended countless funerals, he was dignified, courageous and inspirational. More than that, he was a figurehead who carried the grief of a city with the poise and purpose of a leader. These are the qualities that rightly convince Liverpool fans he will take them forward. Patience is a virtue born of respect. It is not romantic or reverential. It is a matter of trust.

Roy may well prove to be the most successful England manager in this wasted generation. The F.A.’s experiment with technically gifted foreign coaches has backfired spectacularly. And who can be surprised? With a squad of technically destitute players, there is no sense in installing a technical coach. You would not ask Ross Braun to teach your children to drive. Roy’s Swahili skills may be similarly wasted on Rio et al, but he may be able to refine the prosaic brand of football which will have dominated their schooling.

Ultimately, both Hodgson and Dalglish will be judged by history. But let the facts, not abstraction adjudicate in the final summary.