Sorry to hijack your thread Billy but didn't want to start a new one.
I joined the forum at the latter end of the 08/09 season as I wanted to spend time discussing our wonderful Club with like minded people. After finishing so close to winning the Title that season our team started to be dismantled by our corrupt owners needing to pay off banks for money they borrowed to buy us. I spent more and more of my time researching their nefarious dealings with other sports institutions they owned and invariably got involved in the campaign to be rid of them.
After a disastrous season in 09/10 Rafa was duly sacked in the summer with more of our top players sold off. We had Purslow running the show, using Roy as his puppet but with the off field financial crisis we had bigger things to worry about, like would we even exist. After many wranglings in the High Courts we finally got our new owners, so we could all settle down and enjoy the football again.
Unfortunately that didn't happen. The performances and results left us mind blowingly numb, the squad had been descimated and we had a Manager who thought all his birthdays had come at once when he got the job. To him it wasn't an honour, it was a reward and somehow a justification that his career had been a success.
Then Kenny arrived to save the day. Oh how happy everyone was to see him back, the one person we could rely on to put the Club first, who would work his socks off to make us great again. The one person who, just by being there, would get the Kop singing, smiling and excited again. But it didn't last, his signings in the summer were head scratchers to say the least and even though we were sitting 5th in January, rumblings about how dire our play was starting to surface. Malcontent was rife on the forums, arguments broke out over the slightest things and despite two Wembley finals and our first Trophy in 6 years, without a second thought, he was gone.
The divisiveness of these actions amongst the fan base is still being felt, only it's worse now as more and more fans believe that if we can sack a Legend for "failing", it's perfectly right and natural to sack the next guy and probably the one after that and even the one after that too.
So onto Brendan. Not many wanted him as Manager, not many had even thought about him as our Manager as most thought that such a prestigious club as Liverpool would only go for the best. A proven winner, one with credentials, one we could be proud of and one we could win with. The knives were out pretty early and even though we produced the most scintilating football seen at Anfield in a couple of decades, last season now appears to be his undoing.
Personally I doubt that even if we went on a 20 odd game winning streak some would still want him gone. It's all well and good fans saying "all he has to do is start winning" because minds have already been made up, colours pinned to the mast, corners chosen and his possible replacements being discussed. His weaknesses, his naivety, his inexperience, his teeth, his car, his clothes, his new missus are all used as a stick to beat this upstart of a man who thought he was capable of leading this great Club.
In little over 5 years, I've seen some of the best football and some of the worst fan behaviour and attitude towards our own than I've ever experienced. We've had anarchy, court cases, protests, new owners and once Brendan is removed, as he surely will, our 5th Manager.
I really wanted to enjoy this season and the long journey I was expecting to go on with Brendan at the helm but I can't take the negativity of it all any more. The forum is no longer a place to discuss our wonderful football club, it's somewhere folk want to score points, be able to say "told you", or rip each other to shreads for believing because others don't. So from now on I'll be watching my football in the relative peace I used to have on matchdays.
It was a pleasure getting to know some of you but the others, I'll gladly live without