Trending Topics

      Next match: LFC v Brighton [Premier League] Sun 31st Mar @ 2:00 pm
      Anfield

      Today is the 28th of March and on this date LFC's match record is P26 W11 D3 L12

      Writing about Liverpool Football Club

      Read 12536 times
      0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.
      what-a-hit-son
      • LFC Reds Subscriber
      • ******
      • Started Topic
      • 16,466 posts | 4816 
      • t: @MrPrice1979 i: @klmprice101518
      Writing about Liverpool Football Club
      Mar 21, 2014 08:46:03 pm
      There was something similar in the old dug out of which I can't find so thought I'd start a new one.

      There are some superb writers about and I think its worth having a thread so that some of the excellent writing and journalism can be showed off.

      I'll start it with an excellent piece from my favourite, Gareth Roberts from the Anfield Wrap who has a hell a lot to do with the online magazine they do for free.

      Written in the wake of us going to Old Trafford and smashing that shower 3-0:

      BUILDING LIVERPOOL PRIDE


      BY GARETH ROBERTS @robbohuyton

      AS you approach Old Trafford over a bridge that spans the Manchester Ship Canal, the Lego-like frame of the ground begins to loom large; a white support structure visible as the traffic edges closer to a stadium that was once ruined by Luftwaffe bombs.

      The ground was rebuilt of course, and is now second only to Wembley capacity-wise on English shores. But as Hitler’s bombs rained down in 1941, and decades later as new tiers were added and seats were fitted, one building looked on defiantly, same as it ever was; untouched, aging, but still standing proud and significant.

      It’s another landmark on the Salford docklands, one that, for me at least, always grabs my gaze and lifts the spirits: The Liverpool Warehousing Co Ltd.

      The bottom line is that it’s just a disused warehouse. But it sits there watching and waiting for a new lease of life on that corner, reminding the thousands that pass it every day of the name: of the city and of the football club – Liverpool. You can bet that for every Scouser that passes it and smiles, there are hundreds of Mancs that see it and growl. Imagine a huge reminder of Manchester within sight of Anfield every time you went to the match. Yes.

      It flies the flag on enemy territory, it reminds match-goers that they didn’t always have it their own way at Old Trafford and perhaps now, this season, the sight of the name Liverpool stirs up thoughts of how a seemingly unstoppable football supertanker can quickly veer of course with the wrong people at the helm. For Graeme Souness and Roy Hodgson read "The Chosen One".

      But while the name of Liverpool has been a constant on the Salfordian landscape since 1932 according to the building’s frontage, for far too long its significance has only resonated in history. Since Liverpool last lifted the title in 1990 – and won at Old Trafford with two goals from John Barnes along the way – the Reds had won just four more times in 27 attempts in all competitions in front of the Stretford End before Sunday.

      In that time Liverpool finished above United in the league just twice. Last season, the Reds ended the campaign 28 points behind title-winning United. Seemingly as far away as what had become all too depressingly familiar.

      So the warehouse was left waiting another year for its name to bring fresh significance and annoyance to the matchgoers, and few would have expected come August that the rise of Liverpool – and the fall of United – would happen so quickly and dramatically. Many thought Moyes was the wrong man. Few predicted Rodgers was the right one. But wherever opinions lay back then, the degrees of success and failure have been a surprise to most.


      FLANNY JOY: Jon Flanagan ‘salutes’ the Manchester United fans after the 3-0 win at Old Trafford on Sunday. Pic: Dave Rawcliffe

      Sunday’s 3-0 stroll saw Liverpool do the league double over United and put the Reds 14 points clear of "The Chosen One"’ side, who now look almost certain to finish outside the Premier League’s top four.

      That the result has further fuelled dreams of number 19 for Liverpool while simultaneously kicking a rival in the plums is to be savoured and enjoyed, laughed at even. But when the sniggers settle and the smiles subside, pride in a Liverpool side restoring dreams of football’s top prizes will remain.

      But back to the laughs first. Because pretty much everything about Sunday’s game was hilarious. From Moyes suggesting Liverpool were favourites before a ball had been kicked to the half-and-half scarves. From the non-Mancunian replica shirt wearer asking the very Mancunian fanzine seller where the Stretford End was (oh yes) to the fact that ‘The Chosen One’ banner still hangs high in said stand.

      Then the game. As comfortable an Old Trafford win as you’ve seen. All the ball. All the shots. All the penalties. Liverpool as dominant as they have ever been and a United manager making defensive substitutions to save face as the scoreline glowed with Scouse superiority on the scoreboard. ‘Oles’ from the away end. The midfield bossing it. The defence assured. The attack a constant menace. It should have been seven. What no Ferguson?

      An explanation then, for the permanent smiles on the faces of Reds right now. It’s been a while since a Liverpool team, and Liverpool fans, have swaggered around Old Trafford like they did on Sunday. It felt good.

      Talk of a changing of the guard remains premature and in the grand scheme of things it’s just one more win, three more points and a step closer to making the improbable possible. Because West Brom, Everton, Newcastle, Tottenham and Swansea won there too, right?

      Bollocks to facts and figures. It’s much more than that. Some United fans’ dream scenarios have stretched to winning the Champions League to deny Liverpol re-entry into Europe’s top competition after the Reds had finished fourth in the league in their alternative reality.

      Given that mindset, you can guarantee many United supporters expected a performance. Their team would be up for it against Liverpool, they’d raise their game. Brendan Rodgers’ side would freeze in the enemy lair. And Luis Suarez only ever scores against the smaller clubs.

      Steven Gerrard had it spot on in more ways than one. Given what had come before for Liverpool at Old Trafford, the bad decisions, the late equalisers, the inexplicable misses and the below-par performances, 1-0 up was no time to celebrate. 2-0 was though. And 3-0 definitely was.

      Wayne Rooney’s ‘worst day in football’ was just one win for Liverpool. There’s plenty more to play for. But this was a statement. A tale of one manager on the way up and the other on his way out. Of one club figurehead adequately succeeded and another most definitely not. A tale of Liverpool on its way back, becoming one again. A story of a club no longer shrugging its shoulders about mediocrity. More sentences for the chapters about positivity and progress after years of burning the book.

      And all of it on their doorstep. “20 times, 20 times Man United”? The chant during and after the match was desperation and defiance from United fans rather than backing and battle cry. Next season, tickets for ‘The Theatre of Dreams’ will no longer bear the word ‘Champions’. It’s the type of song they’ve long derided us for. But who really noticed anyway with laughing to be done?

      And all within spitting distance of that reminder of the city’s name.

      If warehouses could smile, the former home of The Liverpool Warehousing Co Ltd would have a grin wider than the Mersey right now. As they can’t, Manchester will have to settle for mine. And for the record, it’s not far off.

      http://www.theanfieldwrap.com/2014/03/building-liverpool-pride/
      what-a-hit-son
      • LFC Reds Subscriber
      • ******
      • Started Topic
      • 16,466 posts | 4816 
      • t: @MrPrice1979 i: @klmprice101518
      Re: Writing about Liverpool Football Club
      Reply #1: Apr 06, 2014 07:06:07 am
      Interesting read from the Manc angle:

      The Real Matchday Experience
      EXTORTIONATE ticket prices, stupid kick off times, absentee owners fleecing the club you love
 With all that to bear, it would be easy to walk away from the game – especially when things start to go tits up on the pitch. But we stick with it through the wind and the rain. And why? Well, who better to ask right now than a Manchester United fan? STEPHEN ARMSTRONG from fanzine United We Stand explains.

      I KNOW what you are thinking. Why is a Mancunian – a United one – being invited to write stuff on here? Down with this sort of thing, as Father Ted would say. Before you finger me off your iPad though, I’m not some internet warrior blogger who never goes and still lives with their Mam.

      I go home; I get in all away’s by hook or crook and I’ve missed just two Euro aways since the ban was lifted in 1990. Had I not cocked up by getting married midweek you could halve that. Anyway, I think I’m clued up enough to make sense to you, so stay with me.

      As a place, Liverpool has been professionally very kind to me over many years and that helps me to put aside the ubiquitous ill feeling that manifests between both sets of supporters. This isn’t going to be a Manc-Scouse love in, or one of those ‘hands across the 62’ articles. I’ve never felt the need. Anyway, I’m more of an East Lancs man myself.

      I’ve had my moments on Merseyside. I went to my first game in 1977. I first saw United play against Liverpool at Goodison in 79. It was mental. I was addicted to just about everything that going to the match was about from that night on.

      I come from an era when getting back to Manchester in one piece was a right result. I’ve ran and been caught on the streets around L4 enough times. It came with the territory. Your lads will say the same thing about their trips to Old Trafford. It’s what going to the match was about.

      United had little to be pleased about back then. We had to watch as Liverpool swept most things aside; the 80s in particular being a period of unbearable dominance for many a Mancunian. It never bothered me. A small part of me admired it and I saw only Liverpool’s following as alike to the support I was part of. That does I agree place me in the minority. Don’t get me wrong, I’ll never want you to win anything. I just disliked City more. And Leeds. Oh, and for Panini Sticker reasons, Middlesborough.

      I started going when United weren’t moving anywhere fast. The odd cup run and what became an almost annual result at Anfield being all we could muster. It didn’t matter though. It didn’t matter because I never once lost sight of the reason I started going to the match. I’ll come back to that in a bit.

      My most dismal Anfield memory came in September of 1990. United had won the cup the previous May and Liverpool had placed an eleventh title on top of United’s seven. Alex Ferguson was starting to move the club and we came to Anfield with the hope that this was at time when it was going to turn our way.

      United got butchered.

      It was 3-0 in no time and could have been 10. It was probably John Barnes’s fault. Never in my life had we felt so near on the pitch but ended so far away. The club was by then 23 years since winning a title, and that didn’t look like it would ever end. If you would have told anyone in the ground that day that the home fans would reach 2014 having seen nothing added to that total of 18 titles and that their most fiercest of rivals in the away end would be by then sat two ahead of them they would have thought of you as deluded and probably called for your immediate recapture. I should add here that this isn’t one of those ‘20 times’ gloats that leads to one of those ‘5 times’ responses. I’ve never really been arsed with all that.


      Many reading will feel privileged to have seen a lot of glory. I certainly do. I’ve seen United become League, European and World Champions. Only you can understand what a period of colossal dominance feels like. You did it for two decades, and then we did the same. In United We Stand this summer I made a small reference to your club on that very subject. The world was talking about the post-Busby era and how post-Ferguson United had to avoid repeating it. I said this instead:

      “This transition could take some time and then how the fans react to the inevitable media spin becomes very important indeed. If this doesn’t work out then the cash-laden clubs waiting to pounce will do just that and it isn’t beyond the realms that United’s imperious dominance of the domestic game could well be about to end. If that sounds ridiculous you have no further than about 30 miles to go to see what that looks like. United of 1970 isn’t what must be avoided, it is the Liverpool situation of 1990.”

      The club clearly didn’t read it. If you are a United fan in your 30s you’ve only known United under Alex Ferguson. You’ve only known the quite ridiculous success that he brought to Old Trafford; culminating last season in what was for me his greatest achievement of them all. It’s been just six months since he left. It’s fair to say that since then it’s turned to sh*t.

      http://app.theanfieldwrap.com/issue/08/Page5-real_matchday_experience.html
      what-a-hit-son
      • LFC Reds Subscriber
      • ******
      • Started Topic
      • 16,466 posts | 4816 
      • t: @MrPrice1979 i: @klmprice101518
      Re: Writing about Liverpool Football Club
      Reply #2: Apr 13, 2014 08:50:13 pm
      What have you done in the last 25 years
      By Amy Lawrence

      WALKING up Wembley way, en route to an FA Cup semi-final in an all-seater stadium for an all-ticket match, it was impossible not to take a moment to look back.

      What have you done in the last 25 years?

      I left school, got a degree, landed a series of mundane jobs before stumbling into a unexpectedly wonderful career. I learned to drive, was thrilled with my first vehicle, a vauxhall astra van in which I could play cassettes as loud as they would go. Vinyl went by the wayside and along came CDs. Videos got packed into dusty boxes and along came DVDs. I bought an iPod. I stopped the need to queue at phone boxes with a handful of 20ps and got a mobile phone. I stopped posting letters and started sending emails. I forgot about that wait for your camera films to be developed to see if pictures were any good as each image could be instantly deleted.

      I watched incredulous on television as the Berlin Wall fell and Nelson Mandela was released out of prison. In time I travelled to East Germany and South Africa. I silently got on an aeroplane the night of 9/11 on the way back from a match in Spain. I saw the Iraq war break out on live 24-hour rolling news.

      I watched my team win the title. I took the train and hovercraft to Italy for the World Cup in 1990. The next one, in the USA, was breaking new ground in taking the tournament to an emerging football nation. Since then the greatest show on earth went to France, Japan and South Korea, a united Germany, a South Africa unshackled from apartheid. Next we look ahead to Brazil, then Russia, and beyond that a strange and controversial winter World Cup in Qatar with the prospect of air conditioned stadia.

      Years ago I was forcibly removed by the police from a football terrace for the last time. I observed the football experience change, change, change. All seater-stadia, ticket prices rocketing, an influx of foreign players, overseas managers, broadening horizons, fresh ideas, rebrands all over the place – Division One morphed into the Premier League, the European Cup became the Champions League, where you didn’t even have to be a champion to take part. I have the chance to watch a dazzling Argentinan or phenomenal Portuguese every week from my sofa at home. I can debate with strangers from anywhere in the world in bite-sized 140 character immediate messages.

      I have met countless people, taken countless journeys, written countless words.  I have made friends, some who have stuck around all this time, others who were like ships that passed in the night. I have loved. I became a mother, and I watch my sons grow in a state of constant awe and gratitude. I made a home for my family.

      On FA Cup semi-final weekend 25 years ago I went to football. I stood on a terrace. I heard through the Chinese whispers rolling through the crowd that there was trouble at Hillsborough. People dead. The number kept growing. It was too catastrophic to bear.

      The Hicks sisters, Sarah and Vicky, died together. Teenaged girls who adored their football, just like me, in 1989. At the inquest last week the detail emerged that Vicky wanted to be a football journalist and wrote Liverpool match reports in secret. What might they have made of their lives over the last 25 years? What experiences might they have had? What people might they have met? What lucky ones might they have loved? What everyday conversations and occasions might they have shared with their parents, their extended family, their friends? What children they might have parented themselves?

      The thought extends, embraces, painfully, to all the 96. What might they have done, been and enjoyed about 25 years of life?

      They only went, excitedly, to an FA Cup semi-final. Justice for the 96 is so desperately overdue.


      what-a-hit-son
      • LFC Reds Subscriber
      • ******
      • Started Topic
      • 16,466 posts | 4816 
      • t: @MrPrice1979 i: @klmprice101518
      Re: Writing about Liverpool Football Club
      Reply #3: Apr 17, 2014 08:15:57 pm
      WHAT ABOUT JUSTICE FOR HEYSEL?
      by Oliver Kay

      NOW that the lies, the smears and cruel myths about the Hillsborough disaster have been exposed once and for all, those who clung to them out of warped tribalism have but one straw left to clutch. “What about justice for Heysel?”, they plead. “What about the truth of what happened there?”

      Actually, they might have a point, even if they raise it out of malice rather than consideration for the bereaved. The publication – and belated national acceptance – of the real truth about Hillsborough has been a source of great vindication for all who were affected by that tragedy. But questions undoubtedly remain about the Heysel Stadium disaster, in which 39 spectators – 32 from Italy, four from Belgium, two from France, one from Northern Ireland – were killed in a stampede before the 1985 European Cup final between Liverpool and Juventus.

      Those bereaved and outraged by Hillsborough have fought to keep their campaign for justice alive and been entirely vindicated for doing so. By contrast, Heysel remains the tragedy that dares not speak its name. So let us talk about it. Let us state a few of the facts about whether justice was done.

      We all know that English football, collectively, was punished, with clubs excluded from Uefa competition. Liverpool immediately withdrew, in disgrace, from the next season’s Uefa Cup. Within hours the FA, under pressure from the government, announced that no English club would play in the following season’s Uefa competition – and that of course included Everton, denied a tilt at the European Cup, and Norwich City, denied a first ever European campaign. Two days later Uefa announced an indefinite ban on English clubs. It ended up at five years, with Liverpool serving a sixth as punishment for their supporters’ behaviour at Heysel.

      This was not a knee-jerk reaction to a one-off night of mayhem. This – both the sanction and, it could be argued, the widespread loss of life – had been coming. Heysel was the disgraceful culmination of more than a decade of ugly incidents involving English supporters on their European travels: Tottenham Hotspur in Rotterdam in 1974 and 1983, Leeds United in Paris in 1975, Manchester United in St Etienne in 1977, the national team in Basle in 1981 and so on until the spiral of moronic violence reached its tragic conclusion – logical in one sense, crazy in all others – in Brussels.

      As to whether individuals were brought to account, 27 arrests were made on suspicion of manslaughter and 26 men were charged. (These, incidentally, do not tend to be described as Liverpool supporters – in part because of claims at the time from John Smith, the club’s chairman, and two Merseyside councilors that National Front members from London had been responsible. There are many sensitive issues here, but let us not pussyfoot over this one. As Tony Evans, football editor of The Times and author of Far Foreign Land, a brilliant book about his experiences following Liverpool at Heysel and all over Europe, put it: “It was a red herring. Hooligans from the far right would not have been welcome.”)

      The prosecutions stemmed from television camera footage of the charge – the third such charge in a matter of minutes – that led directly to the deaths of those 39 innocent spectators. There are dozens of points that are usually offered to explain the context, not least over ticketing, segregation and a crumbling stadium, but the context does not begin to excuse what happened. No amount of context ever could.

      Those stampedes might have been considered standard terrace fare at the time, a token act of territorialism and intimidation, but it led innocent fans to flee in terror. Some tried to climb a wall to escape. The wall crumbled. Thirty-nine people were crushed to death. The world was appalled. Turin went into mourning. Liverpool and their supporters were left to live with what they know, 27 years later, to be an indelible stain.

      As for “justice”, an initial inquiry by Marina Coppieters, a leading Belgian judge, found after 18 months that the police and the authorities, in addition to Liverpool supporters, should face charges. Quite apart from the hooliganism, ticketing arrangements and police strategy and responses were criticised. By this stage, English supporters were regarded across Europe as such animals that shock was expressed at how the authorities had played into their hands.

      There was bewilderment, too, at the choice of stadium. And where have you heard that before? Uefa chose a ground that had been built in the 1920s and condemned in the early 1980s for failing to meet modern safety standards, which were far from stringent. Evans recalls that the outer wall, made of cinder block, was decaying, that he was not required to show his ticket and that, long before the stampede, he saw a crash barrier in front of him crumble.

      Jacques Georges, the Uefa president at the time, and Hans Bangerter, his general secretary, were threatened with imprisonment but eventually given conditional discharges. Albert Roosens, the former secretary-general of the Belgian Football Union (BFU), was given a six-month suspended prison sentence for “regrettable negligence” with regard to ticketing arrangements. So was gendarme captain Johan Mahieu, who was in charge of the policing the stands at Heysel. “He made fundamental errors,” Pierre Verlynde, the judge, said. “He was far too passive. I find his negligence extraordinary.”

      In 1989, after a five-month trial in Brussels, 14 of the 26 Liverpool supporters who stood trial were found guilty of involuntary manslaughter and given a three-year prison sentence, suspended for 18 months, and each ended up serving about a year in total in behind bars. The remaining ten defendants were acquitted of manslaughter, but some had their ÂŁ2,000 bail money confiscated, having been absent for part of the trial. And civil damages estimated at more than ÂŁ5million were provisionally awarded to families of the Heysel victims against the convicted fans and the BFU.

      But you never hear of this because the tragedy is taboo. It was only brought into the open when Liverpool and Juventus were drawn together in the Champions League quarter-final in 2005, at which point the Merseyside club, after consultation with their Italian counterparts, announced it would be a game of “friendship”. Before the first leg at Anfield, Liverpool supporters held up a mosaic to form the word “amicizia”. Some of the visiting Juventus fans applauded. Most, it seemed, turned their backs in disgust. And while the rejection of the olive branch met with a little consternation on Merseyside, Liverpool’s supporters know all too well about the type of apology that comes too late, brought by events, to sound truly sincere.

      Heysel is an unspeakably awkward subject for Liverpool – perhaps more, perhaps less, for the anguish the club and the city endured four years later at Hillsborough. It is a black mark and it will be there forever. Supporters of rival teams chant “Murderers” and the Liverpool fans have little response. On one infamous occasion at Goodison Park in 2008, the away fans responded by singing “2-0 to the Murderers”. I know that this was somewhere between a knee-jerk response and an attempt to “reclaim” that offensive description, but it sounded awful. Were they listening in Turin? You would hope not.

      For many years, Liverpool ’s response to Heysel was woefully inadequate. I was shown a copy of the club’s official yearbook for 1985/86. There were two articles about the tragedy on page three, but they were both of the “Let’s put this behind us, improve the matchday Anfield atmosphere and look to restore the club’s good name” variety. There was no direct reference to what had happened. There was no hint of an apology. Later there was a round-up of the previous European Cup campaign, in which 1985/86 was identified as a “watershed” because it would be Liverpool ’s last for some time.

      Over time, there was a recognition that more – much more – needed to be done. In 2000 the city of Liverpool officially commemorated the anniversary of Heysel for the first time – on the suggestion, incidentally, of Peter Millea, the chairman of Liverpool City Council’s Hillsborough disaster working party.

      They do at least now have a memorial plaque at Anfield, they do have extensive coverage of the tragedy on their official website and they do pay tribute on May 30 every year, even if it took far too long for the club to recognise the tragedy and the stain it had left — not unlike Sheffield Wednesday with Hillsborough, although the circumstances there involved appalling failures at executive level.

      Heysel is a huge stain on Liverpool ’s history. It is undeniable. And yet none of this diminishes the club’s or the supporters’ right to grieve or to campaign or to express anger over what happened in Sheffield four years later.

      One real mystery surrounding Heysel is that the tragedy is even more of a taboo in Turin.

      Go on to the Italian club’s official website in search of a tribute and you will struggle to find anything beyond 106 words within a 645-word article called “Juventus wins everything”, a tribute to their successes in the 1970s and 1980s.

      Of the club’s first European Cup triumph in 1985, it says: “The long-awaited success in Europe ’s highest accolade was tainted with sadness” 
 “Something unexplainable happened 
. and 39 innocent victims lost their lives. Football, from that moment, would never be the same again.” 
 “It’s a joyless success, but the victory enabled the Bianconeri to fly to Tokyo in winter to play the Intercontinental Cup final. Argentinos Junior were beaten on penalties and Juve were the world champions.”

      You will have to do an archive search to find anything more than that – specifically a couple of news articles on the anniversary. One includes details of a permanent Heysel exhibit at the museum which opened last year at the new Juventus Stadium. The club has decided that relatives of the victims will always be allowed permanent free access to the museum.

      This is progress. For many years the bereaved met with what they perceived to be a sense of denial from Juventus about a disaster that overshadowed the club’s long-awaited first European Cup win. In The Truths of Heysel – a book written by Andrea Lorentini, whose father Roberto died in Brussels and whose grandfather Otello has led the campaign for the victims to be officially recognised by the club – writes of the “bewilderment, reticence, guilty silences and suspicion” the bereaved have faced in their dealings with Juventus.

      Justice for Heysel? There can never be justice for 39 lives lost at a football match, but it is in Turin , not on Merseyside, that the cries of the bereaved have met with silence down the years.

      The families do not want their lost ones to become a cause celebre in England , particularly not when the purpose has purely been to score points on the terraces. A little more recognition closer to home is what they want.

      http://www.theanfieldwrap.com/2013/05/what-about-justice-for-heysel/
      what-a-hit-son
      • LFC Reds Subscriber
      • ******
      • Started Topic
      • 16,466 posts | 4816 
      • t: @MrPrice1979 i: @klmprice101518
      Re: Writing about Liverpool Football Club
      Reply #4: Aug 24, 2014 08:35:22 pm
      Excellent bit of writing about our manager that sums up exactly how I felt when he was brought in and how I feel about him now:

      BECOMING BRENDAN RODGERS
      by TheAnfieldWrap // 8 June 2014 //

      NEIL SCOTT had his doubts when the current Liverpool manager was appointed two years ago but now he’s a believer

      THERE will be a time, and it won’t be too long coming, when they will make a film about Liverpool’s 2013/14 season. Some kind of fantasy action adventure thing, replete with unexpected twists, daring escapades, unlikely heroes and mean-faced villains. The Goonies with pyro.

      They will assemble a glittering cast, carefully selected to reflect the unique character traits of the main participants.

      Daniel Craig *is* Steven Gerrard.
      Benicio Del Toro *is* Luis Suarez.
      Vin Diesel *is* Martin Skrtel.

      The tortured, howling figure from Munch’s The Scream, trapped in a landscape of eternal damnation, *is* "The Chosen One".

      The world’s sulkiest toddler *is* Jose Mourinho.

      But what about Brendan Rodgers? Who can we get to fairly represent the Liverpool manager, to capture his persona, illustrate his growing assurance and replicate the journey both he and his team have been on since last summer? Because that’s sure-fire BAFTA material, right there.

      Look at the narrative. Trace the story arc. Follow the character development.
      From resented usurper to overreaching tyro to ideological devotee to spiritual leader. He’s come a long way in a short time. And it is to his eternal credit that he has achieved this transformation, and has effectively changed the perceptions of all but his most unreasonable detractors, while maintaining a dignity, a serenity even, that is absent from many of his peers.

      Morgan Freeman?

      It is no secret that I was initially a Rodgers sceptic. I doubted his credentials, questioned the transferability of his methods and inwardly cringed at some of his more contrived soundbites. I was far from convinced that he had the stature to manage a club of the magnitude and ambition of Liverpool.
      There was another issue, though. And although it was an issue that, in effect, had nothing to do with Brendan Rodgers, it was inevitable that he would be caught in the after-blast. That goes with the territory when you’re asked to fill the boots of a legend, particularly when the boots in question have been brutally hacked from said legend’s feet.

      Yes, I’m one of those head-in-the-sand, over-sentimental, backwards-looking dinosaurs who felt that the treatment of Kenny Dalglish in 2012 was a shameful chapter in this club’s history. And, without wishing to reopen old wounds, it’s a view I am happy to stand by. To me, as the FSG choice to take their franchise forward, Rodgers was guilty by association. He wasn’t about to be given an easy ride.

      Welcome to Anfield, Brendan. Watch the door doesn’t hit your arse on the way out.

      Given the different factions that made up our fanbase, the Dalglish loyalists, the Benitez fundamentalists and the infamous hardcore Hodgson ultras, it’s little short of a miracle that, in less than two years, Rodgers has managed to oversee what now appears to be a unified and uniquely committed support. For the first time in a decade our divisions seem behind us and the almost mystical bond between the manager, the club and its followers is on its way to full restoration. Forget, for a moment, the league table. That in itself is an almighty achievement.

      Liam Neeson?

      We’ve all learned a lot over this past season. About our team. Our glorious, unpredictable, irrational team. About our players. Their strengths and weaknesses, their belief, their character. About ourselves and our capacity to grasp hope and follow a dream with unswerving conviction.
      We’ve learned a lot about Brendan Rodgers, too. And he in turn has learned so much more.

      One of the charges levelled against Rodgers during his first season was that we had been saddled with a manager who would, of necessity, be learning on the job. When you consider the alternative, this should perhaps have been less of a concern than it originally appeared.

      Managers, like players, can never regard themselves as the finished article. The game provides a fluid stream of fresh scenarios and changing perspectives. There is a constant need to refine and renew, to challenge your own notions and develop your thinking. Rodgers, as much as anyone, is prepared to embrace this.
      Of course, the basic ethos remains unchanged. Controlling the tempo, optimising the attacking threat, managing the game. But we have seen a growing flexibility in the means used to achieve these objectives, with the emphasis always coming back to the need to coax the maximum outcome from the available resources.

      Three at the back. Midfield diamond. High pressing. Deep-lying playmaker. Interchanging front three. All employed at varying times. All reflecting Rodgers’ willingness to adapt to the demands of his role. And while it is fair to say that not every strategy has been an unqualified success, and questions remain as to his ability to balance attacking fervour with defensive solidity, the team’s results, on the whole, are a testament to the manager’s vision.

      John Malkovich?

      There is, of course, another thing that Rodgers has learned this season. Something that will, in the long run, prove to be an invaluable lesson. He’s learned exactly what it means to be a Liverpool manager. Note the wording. It’s important.

      Anyone can be the manager of Liverpool. Roy Hodgson was the manager of Liverpool. He was never a Liverpool manager. There’s a distinction, however subtle. It’s not something that’s easy to define. It’s all about a feel for the club, an immersion in its history, an understanding of what it represents to its supporters, and an acknowledgement and appreciation of your position in its ongoing mythology. It’s why Mourinho could never be a Liverpool manager and it’s why Dalglish forever will be.

      Brendan Rodgers is now a Liverpool manager. The supporters recognise this. He’s even got a half-decent song, at long last. Face it, as songs go, “There’s only one Brendan Rodgers” is but a short step from the ubiquitous ‘Sloop John B’ chant in terms of mind-numbing banality. If nothing else came out of last season, that alone was reason to rejoice.

      More than anything, it’s a question of trust. As a city, we’re naturally suspicious of incomers, until such time as they prove themselves worthy of our respect. Week by week, match by match, Rodgers has earned our trust. He’s shown that he is committed to helping his team improve, both as players and as people. He’s demonstrated a willingness to allow youth to flourish. He’s cultivated a calmness before the media and a penchant for saying the right thing at the right time that would astound the Being Liverpool cynics. With the faith of the supporters firmly established, there’s no limit on what can be achieved. And that’s quite a prospect. Ask yourself, who would you swap him for? It’s a short list, isn’t it?

      Meryl Streep?

      As he guided us through each of the season’s hurdles, continually finding the answers, moulding a team whose only thought was to score and to score again, winning, always winning, then winning some more, hope gave way to belief. Some spoke of destiny. This was our year. And now you’re gonna believe us
 In truth, we were only ever one bad result away from the end of the dream. That we came so close, came within one result of the most astonishing triumph in our history, is testament to the giant strides made by Rodgers and his team.

      Taken rationally, the achievements of this season were staggering. After the initial despair faded there was a general sense of jubilation, an unprecedented (for a team finishing second) outpouring of acclamation and gratitude. The city was bursting with it.

      I found it hard to share in the celebrations. To me, the way the campaign ended was a crushing disappointment. Even now, footage of our run-in, the blitz of Arsenal, the dissection of United, the overcoming of City, invokes sadness, a pulling in the gut, more than exultation. Not because we might not get the chance again. I don’t buy that for a minute. But because we deserved it. We bloody deserved it.

      What do you say when your heart’s in pieces?
      Many didn’t like it but I understood what Alan Hansen meant when he deemed the season a failure. That’s the kind of unbending, winning-is-everything stance we need to return to.

      If Brendan Rodgers is the man I think he is, he won’t be taken in by the celebrations. I think coming second will burn him up inside. I think it will eat away at him every day and every night. I think it will make him strive for improvement, strive for perfection and teach him to be uncompromising in his efforts to achieve this.

      He’s come out of the shadows of his predecessors. The future is his. The future is red.

      There’s only one man who should play Brendan Rodgers. And that’s Brendan Rodgers.

      I think he’s ready.

      http://www.theanfieldwrap.com/2014/06/becoming-brendan-rodgers-liverpool-manager/
      what-a-hit-son
      • LFC Reds Subscriber
      • ******
      • Started Topic
      • 16,466 posts | 4816 
      • t: @MrPrice1979 i: @klmprice101518
      Re: Writing about Liverpool Football Club
      Reply #5: Nov 11, 2014 11:47:59 pm
      Brought a tear to my eye this.

      I take my Dad to Arrowe Park Hospital for his last operation early tomorrow from his battle with bowel  and liver cancer so this really touched me.

      By the way Ian, if you ever read this, you really have done him proud, believe me.

      God bless your family and may your old man never walk alone.


      We'll meet you by the wall after the match
      By IAN SALMON

      IF you’ll allow me something of an indulgence, I’d like to talk to you about what’s really important.

      I didn’t go to the Chelsea game. I haven’t seen the game, neither live nor on Match of the Day. I haven’t seen the goals, I haven’t seen any match reports, haven’t followed the obvious Twitter explosion (a nailed on penalty apparently?) and haven’t read any of the undoubtedly fine analysis on this site.

      I was supposed to be there. Main Stand, my Dad’s season ticket. My brothers, Keith and Kevin, were supposed to be on The Kop. They weren’t. We didn’t sell our tickets on, didn’t pass them to our mates; there were three empty seats at Anfield on Saturday.

      We spent Saturday and Friday and most of Sunday in Fazakerley Hospital with our Dad and a great deal of extended family and on Sunday, as our Keith put it: “on a sunny Sunday Liverpool afternoon, at two minutes past two, our Father and best mate passed away.”

      Robert Salmon –– Bob, Bobby to his brothers, sisters and workmates –– Dad, was born in 1935. 20th of Feb 1935. 79 years old, going to the match since the 50s. A season-ticket holder for nearly 60 years. He’d seen it all. He’d seen some rubbish in the early days, the second division days, but he’d seen the glory. He saw Shankly build a team, he saw Shankly build HIS team, the team we were given, the team we follow. He saw the birth of all we hold dear, he saw the empire start. He named me for two of the foundation stones of the empire, he named his first son for the men who built the glory.

      He holidayed in Butlins in Pwllheli in (1960 I think), impressed by the fact that Jimmy Melia and Bobby Campbell and Johnny Morrisey were holidaying there. The fact that he and his friends were also associating with a singer called Rory Storm was less notable. Rory’s drummer was even less noted. Lad called Ringo.

      He was there in ’65 at Wembley when we brought home that first FA Cup; that holy cup, the one that started everything, the one we’d wanted for so long. He was there when the lads still went the match in suits and overcoats. When they went to the match in overcoats in May.

      He was there at the semi final when there was a pitch invasion, when the last whistle brought a joyous pitch invasion with the knowledge that Wembley beckoned. All the time that our Father stood as a role model for us we knew that he’d kept the copy of the Echo that contained a photo that featured him as a member of the army that invaded the pitch. We loved him all the more for that. One of the many, many things that we loved him for.

      He did the homes, he did the aways. With his mates, with our Uncles; Lenny, Dave, Jimmy. With his mates. He did the hard miles in the years before motorways. Sunderland in winter without motorways? He did 74 to watch us ram Supermac’s words down his throat. He did the leagues, all those leagues, all those glorious leagues that we took as birthright, he saw them all. He saw such things, such wonders. He saw the glory which was Rome. He stayed sober for three days (he always claimed he did anyway) in order that he could see the city and enjoy the city. He ate nothing but ice cream for three days because he was a simple Liverpool lad; an Everton-born Liverpool lad who didn’t trust that fancy foreign food. When he found a menu which contained the word ‘spaghetti’ (which one would imagine would be plentiful in that particular city) he ordered it and was amazed at ‘this white stuff’ that arrived having fully expected it to be of the tinned Heinz variety. That’s what he told us, we believed him, you believe your Dad on these things.

      Bruges in 78 by boat. Back by boat. Nearly back to Bruges by boat. The ‘no-drinking’ concept firmly abandoned, he had decided to get back on the boat to (and I quote) ‘thank the captain for a nice ride.’

      He drank in the Park Hotel in Netherton after home games in the 70s and 80s. Drank with Roy Evans and Ronnie Moran and Ronnie Whelan and Ian Rush and that period of stardom and greatness (and if the dates are wrong or the players were others then it’s because the legend has become bigger in my mind ––Evo’s a definite though).

      Paris. Three European Cups. He was at three European Cup wins. Not bad that, is it? Not many teams can do that can they? And he’s one of so many that can claim that. His story, his footballing story, is the same as yours, or your Dad’s or your Granddad’s, it’s what we all share, it’s what unites every one of us. My Dad was one of us. Unique and wonderful and brilliant and one of us, one of this big thing that we all have in common. In love with the game, in love with the club.

      He was at Hillsborough. He was in the stand and he watched as the stretchers came past, powerless to do anything and waiting to see if the next one had either Keith or Kevin on it. He was lucky. We were lucky. Our family came home but he knew how close it could have been, knew how lucky we were. He didn’t talk about what he saw, we didn’t discuss the details very often. One of the guys that went there on the coach that my Dad went on was one of the 96. The coach waited, had to leave without him, had to come back not knowing. We don’t know who it was. When the phone call came through that evening that told him that it was the first time that I’d ever seen my Father cry.

      And he brought us up on this club that he loved, this game that he loved. The three of us. Keith and Kevin before me. I came to the game relatively late on but I got there. Late 70s, through the 80s, educated the right way. The Paddock first. For us. Back when it was a big gap between the main stand and the pitch. Then the Kop. But he was the Main Stand. As long as I can remember, the Main Stand. Where the grown ups sit. I’m older now than he was then but the Main Stand is where the grown ups sit. I’m not a grown up, I never will be. At heart I don’t think he was either. But he was Main Stand and we were Kop. And we’d go together and we’d split up when we got there and we’d agree one thing, always one thing (and this is where the tears start) “We’ll meet you at the wall after the match”.

      The wall. Facing the corner where the The Kop and The Main Stand meet. That’s where we’d meet them; my Dad, Lenny, my Granddad (his best mates, reunited with his best mates now), we’d meet them by the wall. Gone now. Gone for years, replaced by a fence but still it was “We’ll meet you by the wall”. The fence has gone now, it’s just ground waiting for the expansion but we were “meeting by the wall” up until about a month ago when Dad became too weak to go anymore.

      Walking had been an issue for a while but he’d done his damnedest to keep going. We hoped for more, hoped to get him to the game, hoped for the Madrid game, for possibly one last big European night, spoke to the club, asked if we could arrange to bring him in a wheelchair, get him to his seat, store the chair somewhere (they offered up a space under the Kop, they were as excellent as you’d want them to be) and get back to him at the end of the game.

      But he was too tired and the weather was foul and it was cold. It didn’t happen. Chelsea maybe? Maybe we could get him to the Chelsea game? He had oxygen at home, if we could get a portable version? If we could find a space where he could watch from the wheelchair?

      We didn’t get to ask the question. He was hospitalised a week before the Chelsea game and on the day before the match he started to go downhill.

      So we didn’t go the game. We didn’t see the coverage, we didn’t watch Match of the Day. We possibly never will because, whatever happened in the game, it doesn’t really matter.

      I found out a few years ago that my Dad’s ambition had been to be a sports journalist. I’ve somehow, luckily, in a pretty unlikely turn of events, managed to do some of what he wanted to do. I’m delighted by that fact. Delighted, proud and comforted. Something of him is here, always here, in my opinions, in the way I voice them, in the fact that I do it at all. In the fact that I go to the game.

      My Dad’s story is the same as yours, as your Dad’s as your Granddad’s as all of us. One of the many thousands of us whose name you never know but you might have passed by as you walk to your seat or in the street before the game. I’m lucky enough to be able to tell you it here because of everything he gave me. Because of the love and the passion and the allegiance and the faith in the team.

      I hope I’ve done him some justice here, I’ve not even covered the things that made him truly special; they’re unique and indescribable. His fight to stay with us over the last three days has been immense and inspirational. It allowed us all to say our goodbyes, to tell him how much he was loved. And God he was loved. By so many people. He was that most wonderful of things; a truly good man.

      As we were with him we played him You’ll Never Walk Alone. Twice on that last morning. A song to support him, to let him know that we were there, to let him know that he wasn’t alone. He knew. He wasn’t. He was never alone. The Palace game is going to be difficult, I may not be able to handle the minutes before kick off. It’s always an emotional song, obviously it’s always an emotional song, this time it’s going to be a million times more powerful. This time it’s for my Dad, for every time from now on, it’s for my Dad.

      We told him this. And we told him one other thing. One of the last things that we told him; to let him know that we know we’ll see him again, to let him know that he’ll see his friends again, those that went before him who he’d missed and whose lives had contained as much of the passion for this great thing that we all share as his had.

      We told him this:

      “We’ll meet you by the wall after the match.”

      And we will.

      Good night, Dad.

      YNWA.

      stuey
      • LFC Reds Subscriber
      • ******
      • 35,961 posts | 3943 
      Re: Writing about Liverpool Football Club
      Reply #6: Nov 12, 2014 11:23:09 am
      Brought a tear to my eye this.

      I take my Dad to Arrowe Park Hospital for his last operation early tomorrow from his battle with bowel  and liver cancer so this really touched me.

      By the way Ian, if you ever read this, you really have done him proud, believe me.

      God bless your family and may your old man never walk alone.


      We'll meet you by the wall after the match
      By IAN SALMON

      IF you’ll allow me something of an indulgence, I’d like to talk to you about what’s really important.

      I didn’t go to the Chelsea game. I haven’t seen the game, neither live nor on Match of the Day. I haven’t seen the goals, I haven’t seen any match reports, haven’t followed the obvious Twitter explosion (a nailed on penalty apparently?) and haven’t read any of the undoubtedly fine analysis on this site.

      I was supposed to be there. Main Stand, my Dad’s season ticket. My brothers, Keith and Kevin, were supposed to be on The Kop. They weren’t. We didn’t sell our tickets on, didn’t pass them to our mates; there were three empty seats at Anfield on Saturday.

      We spent Saturday and Friday and most of Sunday in Fazakerley Hospital with our Dad and a great deal of extended family and on Sunday, as our Keith put it: “on a sunny Sunday Liverpool afternoon, at two minutes past two, our Father and best mate passed away.”

      Robert Salmon –– Bob, Bobby to his brothers, sisters and workmates –– Dad, was born in 1935. 20th of Feb 1935. 79 years old, going to the match since the 50s. A season-ticket holder for nearly 60 years. He’d seen it all. He’d seen some rubbish in the early days, the second division days, but he’d seen the glory. He saw Shankly build a team, he saw Shankly build HIS team, the team we were given, the team we follow. He saw the birth of all we hold dear, he saw the empire start. He named me for two of the foundation stones of the empire, he named his first son for the men who built the glory.

      He holidayed in Butlins in Pwllheli in (1960 I think), impressed by the fact that Jimmy Melia and Bobby Campbell and Johnny Morrisey were holidaying there. The fact that he and his friends were also associating with a singer called Rory Storm was less notable. Rory’s drummer was even less noted. Lad called Ringo.

      He was there in ’65 at Wembley when we brought home that first FA Cup; that holy cup, the one that started everything, the one we’d wanted for so long. He was there when the lads still went the match in suits and overcoats. When they went to the match in overcoats in May.

      He was there at the semi final when there was a pitch invasion, when the last whistle brought a joyous pitch invasion with the knowledge that Wembley beckoned. All the time that our Father stood as a role model for us we knew that he’d kept the copy of the Echo that contained a photo that featured him as a member of the army that invaded the pitch. We loved him all the more for that. One of the many, many things that we loved him for.

      He did the homes, he did the aways. With his mates, with our Uncles; Lenny, Dave, Jimmy. With his mates. He did the hard miles in the years before motorways. Sunderland in winter without motorways? He did 74 to watch us ram Supermac’s words down his throat. He did the leagues, all those leagues, all those glorious leagues that we took as birthright, he saw them all. He saw such things, such wonders. He saw the glory which was Rome. He stayed sober for three days (he always claimed he did anyway) in order that he could see the city and enjoy the city. He ate nothing but ice cream for three days because he was a simple Liverpool lad; an Everton-born Liverpool lad who didn’t trust that fancy foreign food. When he found a menu which contained the word ‘spaghetti’ (which one would imagine would be plentiful in that particular city) he ordered it and was amazed at ‘this white stuff’ that arrived having fully expected it to be of the tinned Heinz variety. That’s what he told us, we believed him, you believe your Dad on these things.

      Bruges in 78 by boat. Back by boat. Nearly back to Bruges by boat. The ‘no-drinking’ concept firmly abandoned, he had decided to get back on the boat to (and I quote) ‘thank the captain for a nice ride.’

      He drank in the Park Hotel in Netherton after home games in the 70s and 80s. Drank with Roy Evans and Ronnie Moran and Ronnie Whelan and Ian Rush and that period of stardom and greatness (and if the dates are wrong or the players were others then it’s because the legend has become bigger in my mind ––Evo’s a definite though).

      Paris. Three European Cups. He was at three European Cup wins. Not bad that, is it? Not many teams can do that can they? And he’s one of so many that can claim that. His story, his footballing story, is the same as yours, or your Dad’s or your Granddad’s, it’s what we all share, it’s what unites every one of us. My Dad was one of us. Unique and wonderful and brilliant and one of us, one of this big thing that we all have in common. In love with the game, in love with the club.

      He was at Hillsborough. He was in the stand and he watched as the stretchers came past, powerless to do anything and waiting to see if the next one had either Keith or Kevin on it. He was lucky. We were lucky. Our family came home but he knew how close it could have been, knew how lucky we were. He didn’t talk about what he saw, we didn’t discuss the details very often. One of the guys that went there on the coach that my Dad went on was one of the 96. The coach waited, had to leave without him, had to come back not knowing. We don’t know who it was. When the phone call came through that evening that told him that it was the first time that I’d ever seen my Father cry.

      And he brought us up on this club that he loved, this game that he loved. The three of us. Keith and Kevin before me. I came to the game relatively late on but I got there. Late 70s, through the 80s, educated the right way. The Paddock first. For us. Back when it was a big gap between the main stand and the pitch. Then the Kop. But he was the Main Stand. As long as I can remember, the Main Stand. Where the grown ups sit. I’m older now than he was then but the Main Stand is where the grown ups sit. I’m not a grown up, I never will be. At heart I don’t think he was either. But he was Main Stand and we were Kop. And we’d go together and we’d split up when we got there and we’d agree one thing, always one thing (and this is where the tears start) “We’ll meet you at the wall after the match”.

      The wall. Facing the corner where the The Kop and The Main Stand meet. That’s where we’d meet them; my Dad, Lenny, my Granddad (his best mates, reunited with his best mates now), we’d meet them by the wall. Gone now. Gone for years, replaced by a fence but still it was “We’ll meet you by the wall”. The fence has gone now, it’s just ground waiting for the expansion but we were “meeting by the wall” up until about a month ago when Dad became too weak to go anymore.

      Walking had been an issue for a while but he’d done his damnedest to keep going. We hoped for more, hoped to get him to the game, hoped for the Madrid game, for possibly one last big European night, spoke to the club, asked if we could arrange to bring him in a wheelchair, get him to his seat, store the chair somewhere (they offered up a space under the Kop, they were as excellent as you’d want them to be) and get back to him at the end of the game.

      But he was too tired and the weather was foul and it was cold. It didn’t happen. Chelsea maybe? Maybe we could get him to the Chelsea game? He had oxygen at home, if we could get a portable version? If we could find a space where he could watch from the wheelchair?

      We didn’t get to ask the question. He was hospitalised a week before the Chelsea game and on the day before the match he started to go downhill.

      So we didn’t go the game. We didn’t see the coverage, we didn’t watch Match of the Day. We possibly never will because, whatever happened in the game, it doesn’t really matter.

      I found out a few years ago that my Dad’s ambition had been to be a sports journalist. I’ve somehow, luckily, in a pretty unlikely turn of events, managed to do some of what he wanted to do. I’m delighted by that fact. Delighted, proud and comforted. Something of him is here, always here, in my opinions, in the way I voice them, in the fact that I do it at all. In the fact that I go to the game.

      My Dad’s story is the same as yours, as your Dad’s as your Granddad’s as all of us. One of the many thousands of us whose name you never know but you might have passed by as you walk to your seat or in the street before the game. I’m lucky enough to be able to tell you it here because of everything he gave me. Because of the love and the passion and the allegiance and the faith in the team.

      I hope I’ve done him some justice here, I’ve not even covered the things that made him truly special; they’re unique and indescribable. His fight to stay with us over the last three days has been immense and inspirational. It allowed us all to say our goodbyes, to tell him how much he was loved. And God he was loved. By so many people. He was that most wonderful of things; a truly good man.

      As we were with him we played him You’ll Never Walk Alone. Twice on that last morning. A song to support him, to let him know that we were there, to let him know that he wasn’t alone. He knew. He wasn’t. He was never alone. The Palace game is going to be difficult, I may not be able to handle the minutes before kick off. It’s always an emotional song, obviously it’s always an emotional song, this time it’s going to be a million times more powerful. This time it’s for my Dad, for every time from now on, it’s for my Dad.

      We told him this. And we told him one other thing. One of the last things that we told him; to let him know that we know we’ll see him again, to let him know that he’ll see his friends again, those that went before him who he’d missed and whose lives had contained as much of the passion for this great thing that we all share as his had.

      We told him this:

      “We’ll meet you by the wall after the match.”

      And we will.

      Good night, Dad.

      YNWA.



      Teary-eyed meself here Dave on reading that emotional testament to what supporting Liverpool Football Club means to generations of a family and how facets of the club's history so profoundly affected them.
      Much respect to the writer.

      Hope your father is responding well to the treatment mate, suffice to say I know what is involved and believe that determination and strength of character can go a long way in confronting the insidious disease that is cancer.
      Keep your pecker up mate. 
      Diego LFC
      • Forum Legend - Paisley
      • *****

      • 19,326 posts | 2823 
      • Sempre Liverpool
      Re: Writing about Liverpool Football Club
      Reply #7: Nov 12, 2014 01:44:08 pm
      Brought a tear to my eye this.

      I take my Dad to Arrowe Park Hospital for his last operation early tomorrow from his battle with bowel  and liver cancer so this really touched me.

      By the way Ian, if you ever read this, you really have done him proud, believe me.

      God bless your family and may your old man never walk alone.


      We'll meet you by the wall after the match
      By IAN SALMON

      IF you’ll allow me something of an indulgence, I’d like to talk to you about what’s really important.

      I didn’t go to the Chelsea game. I haven’t seen the game, neither live nor on Match of the Day. I haven’t seen the goals, I haven’t seen any match reports, haven’t followed the obvious Twitter explosion (a nailed on penalty apparently?) and haven’t read any of the undoubtedly fine analysis on this site.

      I was supposed to be there. Main Stand, my Dad’s season ticket. My brothers, Keith and Kevin, were supposed to be on The Kop. They weren’t. We didn’t sell our tickets on, didn’t pass them to our mates; there were three empty seats at Anfield on Saturday.

      We spent Saturday and Friday and most of Sunday in Fazakerley Hospital with our Dad and a great deal of extended family and on Sunday, as our Keith put it: “on a sunny Sunday Liverpool afternoon, at two minutes past two, our Father and best mate passed away.”

      Robert Salmon –– Bob, Bobby to his brothers, sisters and workmates –– Dad, was born in 1935. 20th of Feb 1935. 79 years old, going to the match since the 50s. A season-ticket holder for nearly 60 years. He’d seen it all. He’d seen some rubbish in the early days, the second division days, but he’d seen the glory. He saw Shankly build a team, he saw Shankly build HIS team, the team we were given, the team we follow. He saw the birth of all we hold dear, he saw the empire start. He named me for two of the foundation stones of the empire, he named his first son for the men who built the glory.

      He holidayed in Butlins in Pwllheli in (1960 I think), impressed by the fact that Jimmy Melia and Bobby Campbell and Johnny Morrisey were holidaying there. The fact that he and his friends were also associating with a singer called Rory Storm was less notable. Rory’s drummer was even less noted. Lad called Ringo.

      He was there in ’65 at Wembley when we brought home that first FA Cup; that holy cup, the one that started everything, the one we’d wanted for so long. He was there when the lads still went the match in suits and overcoats. When they went to the match in overcoats in May.

      He was there at the semi final when there was a pitch invasion, when the last whistle brought a joyous pitch invasion with the knowledge that Wembley beckoned. All the time that our Father stood as a role model for us we knew that he’d kept the copy of the Echo that contained a photo that featured him as a member of the army that invaded the pitch. We loved him all the more for that. One of the many, many things that we loved him for.

      He did the homes, he did the aways. With his mates, with our Uncles; Lenny, Dave, Jimmy. With his mates. He did the hard miles in the years before motorways. Sunderland in winter without motorways? He did 74 to watch us ram Supermac’s words down his throat. He did the leagues, all those leagues, all those glorious leagues that we took as birthright, he saw them all. He saw such things, such wonders. He saw the glory which was Rome. He stayed sober for three days (he always claimed he did anyway) in order that he could see the city and enjoy the city. He ate nothing but ice cream for three days because he was a simple Liverpool lad; an Everton-born Liverpool lad who didn’t trust that fancy foreign food. When he found a menu which contained the word ‘spaghetti’ (which one would imagine would be plentiful in that particular city) he ordered it and was amazed at ‘this white stuff’ that arrived having fully expected it to be of the tinned Heinz variety. That’s what he told us, we believed him, you believe your Dad on these things.

      Bruges in 78 by boat. Back by boat. Nearly back to Bruges by boat. The ‘no-drinking’ concept firmly abandoned, he had decided to get back on the boat to (and I quote) ‘thank the captain for a nice ride.’

      He drank in the Park Hotel in Netherton after home games in the 70s and 80s. Drank with Roy Evans and Ronnie Moran and Ronnie Whelan and Ian Rush and that period of stardom and greatness (and if the dates are wrong or the players were others then it’s because the legend has become bigger in my mind ––Evo’s a definite though).

      Paris. Three European Cups. He was at three European Cup wins. Not bad that, is it? Not many teams can do that can they? And he’s one of so many that can claim that. His story, his footballing story, is the same as yours, or your Dad’s or your Granddad’s, it’s what we all share, it’s what unites every one of us. My Dad was one of us. Unique and wonderful and brilliant and one of us, one of this big thing that we all have in common. In love with the game, in love with the club.

      He was at Hillsborough. He was in the stand and he watched as the stretchers came past, powerless to do anything and waiting to see if the next one had either Keith or Kevin on it. He was lucky. We were lucky. Our family came home but he knew how close it could have been, knew how lucky we were. He didn’t talk about what he saw, we didn’t discuss the details very often. One of the guys that went there on the coach that my Dad went on was one of the 96. The coach waited, had to leave without him, had to come back not knowing. We don’t know who it was. When the phone call came through that evening that told him that it was the first time that I’d ever seen my Father cry.

      And he brought us up on this club that he loved, this game that he loved. The three of us. Keith and Kevin before me. I came to the game relatively late on but I got there. Late 70s, through the 80s, educated the right way. The Paddock first. For us. Back when it was a big gap between the main stand and the pitch. Then the Kop. But he was the Main Stand. As long as I can remember, the Main Stand. Where the grown ups sit. I’m older now than he was then but the Main Stand is where the grown ups sit. I’m not a grown up, I never will be. At heart I don’t think he was either. But he was Main Stand and we were Kop. And we’d go together and we’d split up when we got there and we’d agree one thing, always one thing (and this is where the tears start) “We’ll meet you at the wall after the match”.

      The wall. Facing the corner where the The Kop and The Main Stand meet. That’s where we’d meet them; my Dad, Lenny, my Granddad (his best mates, reunited with his best mates now), we’d meet them by the wall. Gone now. Gone for years, replaced by a fence but still it was “We’ll meet you by the wall”. The fence has gone now, it’s just ground waiting for the expansion but we were “meeting by the wall” up until about a month ago when Dad became too weak to go anymore.

      Walking had been an issue for a while but he’d done his damnedest to keep going. We hoped for more, hoped to get him to the game, hoped for the Madrid game, for possibly one last big European night, spoke to the club, asked if we could arrange to bring him in a wheelchair, get him to his seat, store the chair somewhere (they offered up a space under the Kop, they were as excellent as you’d want them to be) and get back to him at the end of the game.

      But he was too tired and the weather was foul and it was cold. It didn’t happen. Chelsea maybe? Maybe we could get him to the Chelsea game? He had oxygen at home, if we could get a portable version? If we could find a space where he could watch from the wheelchair?

      We didn’t get to ask the question. He was hospitalised a week before the Chelsea game and on the day before the match he started to go downhill.

      So we didn’t go the game. We didn’t see the coverage, we didn’t watch Match of the Day. We possibly never will because, whatever happened in the game, it doesn’t really matter.

      I found out a few years ago that my Dad’s ambition had been to be a sports journalist. I’ve somehow, luckily, in a pretty unlikely turn of events, managed to do some of what he wanted to do. I’m delighted by that fact. Delighted, proud and comforted. Something of him is here, always here, in my opinions, in the way I voice them, in the fact that I do it at all. In the fact that I go to the game.

      My Dad’s story is the same as yours, as your Dad’s as your Granddad’s as all of us. One of the many thousands of us whose name you never know but you might have passed by as you walk to your seat or in the street before the game. I’m lucky enough to be able to tell you it here because of everything he gave me. Because of the love and the passion and the allegiance and the faith in the team.

      I hope I’ve done him some justice here, I’ve not even covered the things that made him truly special; they’re unique and indescribable. His fight to stay with us over the last three days has been immense and inspirational. It allowed us all to say our goodbyes, to tell him how much he was loved. And God he was loved. By so many people. He was that most wonderful of things; a truly good man.

      As we were with him we played him You’ll Never Walk Alone. Twice on that last morning. A song to support him, to let him know that we were there, to let him know that he wasn’t alone. He knew. He wasn’t. He was never alone. The Palace game is going to be difficult, I may not be able to handle the minutes before kick off. It’s always an emotional song, obviously it’s always an emotional song, this time it’s going to be a million times more powerful. This time it’s for my Dad, for every time from now on, it’s for my Dad.

      We told him this. And we told him one other thing. One of the last things that we told him; to let him know that we know we’ll see him again, to let him know that he’ll see his friends again, those that went before him who he’d missed and whose lives had contained as much of the passion for this great thing that we all share as his had.

      We told him this:

      “We’ll meet you by the wall after the match.”

      And we will.

      Good night, Dad.

      YNWA.


      This is a beautiful read. YNWA Robert
      billythered
      • LFC Reds Subscriber
      • ******
      • 10,821 posts | 4920 
      • From Doubters to Champions of the World
      Re: Writing about Liverpool Football Club
      Reply #8: Nov 12, 2014 03:27:15 pm
      Brought a tear to my eye this.

      I take my Dad to Arrowe Park Hospital for his last operation early tomorrow from his battle with bowel  and liver cancer so this really touched me.

      By the way Ian, if you ever read this, you really have done him proud, believe me.

      God bless your family and may your old man never walk alone.


      We'll meet you by the wall after the match
      By IAN SALMON

      IF you’ll allow me something of an indulgence, I’d like to talk to you about what’s really important.

      I didn’t go to the Chelsea game. I haven’t seen the game, neither live nor on Match of the Day. I haven’t seen the goals, I haven’t seen any match reports, haven’t followed the obvious Twitter explosion (a nailed on penalty apparently?) and haven’t read any of the undoubtedly fine analysis on this site.

      I was supposed to be there. Main Stand, my Dad’s season ticket. My brothers, Keith and Kevin, were supposed to be on The Kop. They weren’t. We didn’t sell our tickets on, didn’t pass them to our mates; there were three empty seats at Anfield on Saturday.

      We spent Saturday and Friday and most of Sunday in Fazakerley Hospital with our Dad and a great deal of extended family and on Sunday, as our Keith put it: “on a sunny Sunday Liverpool afternoon, at two minutes past two, our Father and best mate passed away.”

      Robert Salmon –– Bob, Bobby to his brothers, sisters and workmates –– Dad, was born in 1935. 20th of Feb 1935. 79 years old, going to the match since the 50s. A season-ticket holder for nearly 60 years. He’d seen it all. He’d seen some rubbish in the early days, the second division days, but he’d seen the glory. He saw Shankly build a team, he saw Shankly build HIS team, the team we were given, the team we follow. He saw the birth of all we hold dear, he saw the empire start. He named me for two of the foundation stones of the empire, he named his first son for the men who built the glory.

      He holidayed in Butlins in Pwllheli in (1960 I think), impressed by the fact that Jimmy Melia and Bobby Campbell and Johnny Morrisey were holidaying there. The fact that he and his friends were also associating with a singer called Rory Storm was less notable. Rory’s drummer was even less noted. Lad called Ringo.

      He was there in ’65 at Wembley when we brought home that first FA Cup; that holy cup, the one that started everything, the one we’d wanted for so long. He was there when the lads still went the match in suits and overcoats. When they went to the match in overcoats in May.

      He was there at the semi final when there was a pitch invasion, when the last whistle brought a joyous pitch invasion with the knowledge that Wembley beckoned. All the time that our Father stood as a role model for us we knew that he’d kept the copy of the Echo that contained a photo that featured him as a member of the army that invaded the pitch. We loved him all the more for that. One of the many, many things that we loved him for.

      He did the homes, he did the aways. With his mates, with our Uncles; Lenny, Dave, Jimmy. With his mates. He did the hard miles in the years before motorways. Sunderland in winter without motorways? He did 74 to watch us ram Supermac’s words down his throat. He did the leagues, all those leagues, all those glorious leagues that we took as birthright, he saw them all. He saw such things, such wonders. He saw the glory which was Rome. He stayed sober for three days (he always claimed he did anyway) in order that he could see the city and enjoy the city. He ate nothing but ice cream for three days because he was a simple Liverpool lad; an Everton-born Liverpool lad who didn’t trust that fancy foreign food. When he found a menu which contained the word ‘spaghetti’ (which one would imagine would be plentiful in that particular city) he ordered it and was amazed at ‘this white stuff’ that arrived having fully expected it to be of the tinned Heinz variety. That’s what he told us, we believed him, you believe your Dad on these things.

      Bruges in 78 by boat. Back by boat. Nearly back to Bruges by boat. The ‘no-drinking’ concept firmly abandoned, he had decided to get back on the boat to (and I quote) ‘thank the captain for a nice ride.’

      He drank in the Park Hotel in Netherton after home games in the 70s and 80s. Drank with Roy Evans and Ronnie Moran and Ronnie Whelan and Ian Rush and that period of stardom and greatness (and if the dates are wrong or the players were others then it’s because the legend has become bigger in my mind ––Evo’s a definite though).

      Paris. Three European Cups. He was at three European Cup wins. Not bad that, is it? Not many teams can do that can they? And he’s one of so many that can claim that. His story, his footballing story, is the same as yours, or your Dad’s or your Granddad’s, it’s what we all share, it’s what unites every one of us. My Dad was one of us. Unique and wonderful and brilliant and one of us, one of this big thing that we all have in common. In love with the game, in love with the club.

      He was at Hillsborough. He was in the stand and he watched as the stretchers came past, powerless to do anything and waiting to see if the next one had either Keith or Kevin on it. He was lucky. We were lucky. Our family came home but he knew how close it could have been, knew how lucky we were. He didn’t talk about what he saw, we didn’t discuss the details very often. One of the guys that went there on the coach that my Dad went on was one of the 96. The coach waited, had to leave without him, had to come back not knowing. We don’t know who it was. When the phone call came through that evening that told him that it was the first time that I’d ever seen my Father cry.

      And he brought us up on this club that he loved, this game that he loved. The three of us. Keith and Kevin before me. I came to the game relatively late on but I got there. Late 70s, through the 80s, educated the right way. The Paddock first. For us. Back when it was a big gap between the main stand and the pitch. Then the Kop. But he was the Main Stand. As long as I can remember, the Main Stand. Where the grown ups sit. I’m older now than he was then but the Main Stand is where the grown ups sit. I’m not a grown up, I never will be. At heart I don’t think he was either. But he was Main Stand and we were Kop. And we’d go together and we’d split up when we got there and we’d agree one thing, always one thing (and this is where the tears start) “We’ll meet you at the wall after the match”.

      The wall. Facing the corner where the The Kop and The Main Stand meet. That’s where we’d meet them; my Dad, Lenny, my Granddad (his best mates, reunited with his best mates now), we’d meet them by the wall. Gone now. Gone for years, replaced by a fence but still it was “We’ll meet you by the wall”. The fence has gone now, it’s just ground waiting for the expansion but we were “meeting by the wall” up until about a month ago when Dad became too weak to go anymore.

      Walking had been an issue for a while but he’d done his damnedest to keep going. We hoped for more, hoped to get him to the game, hoped for the Madrid game, for possibly one last big European night, spoke to the club, asked if we could arrange to bring him in a wheelchair, get him to his seat, store the chair somewhere (they offered up a space under the Kop, they were as excellent as you’d want them to be) and get back to him at the end of the game.

      But he was too tired and the weather was foul and it was cold. It didn’t happen. Chelsea maybe? Maybe we could get him to the Chelsea game? He had oxygen at home, if we could get a portable version? If we could find a space where he could watch from the wheelchair?

      We didn’t get to ask the question. He was hospitalised a week before the Chelsea game and on the day before the match he started to go downhill.

      So we didn’t go the game. We didn’t see the coverage, we didn’t watch Match of the Day. We possibly never will because, whatever happened in the game, it doesn’t really matter.

      I found out a few years ago that my Dad’s ambition had been to be a sports journalist. I’ve somehow, luckily, in a pretty unlikely turn of events, managed to do some of what he wanted to do. I’m delighted by that fact. Delighted, proud and comforted. Something of him is here, always here, in my opinions, in the way I voice them, in the fact that I do it at all. In the fact that I go to the game.

      My Dad’s story is the same as yours, as your Dad’s as your Granddad’s as all of us. One of the many thousands of us whose name you never know but you might have passed by as you walk to your seat or in the street before the game. I’m lucky enough to be able to tell you it here because of everything he gave me. Because of the love and the passion and the allegiance and the faith in the team.

      I hope I’ve done him some justice here, I’ve not even covered the things that made him truly special; they’re unique and indescribable. His fight to stay with us over the last three days has been immense and inspirational. It allowed us all to say our goodbyes, to tell him how much he was loved. And God he was loved. By so many people. He was that most wonderful of things; a truly good man.

      As we were with him we played him You’ll Never Walk Alone. Twice on that last morning. A song to support him, to let him know that we were there, to let him know that he wasn’t alone. He knew. He wasn’t. He was never alone. The Palace game is going to be difficult, I may not be able to handle the minutes before kick off. It’s always an emotional song, obviously it’s always an emotional song, this time it’s going to be a million times more powerful. This time it’s for my Dad, for every time from now on, it’s for my Dad.

      We told him this. And we told him one other thing. One of the last things that we told him; to let him know that we know we’ll see him again, to let him know that he’ll see his friends again, those that went before him who he’d missed and whose lives had contained as much of the passion for this great thing that we all share as his had.

      We told him this:

      “We’ll meet you by the wall after the match.”

      And we will.

      Good night, Dad.

      YNWA.




      A truly moving piece of writing,  brought tears to my eyes, thank you so much Ian for sharing,

      Take comfort that your dad would be immensely proud of you,


      RIP  Bob Salmon    YNWA
      hardcoresoldier
      • LFC Reds Subscriber
      • ******
      • 5,104 posts | 1275 
      • The Liverpool Way is The Only Way
      Re: Writing about Liverpool Football Club
      Reply #9: Nov 13, 2014 12:19:16 am
      Brought a tear to my eye this.

      I take my Dad to Arrowe Park Hospital for his last operation early tomorrow from his battle with bowel  and liver cancer so this really touched me.

      By the way Ian, if you ever read this, you really have done him proud, believe me.

      God bless your family and may your old man never walk alone.


      We'll meet you by the wall after the match
      By IAN SALMON

      IF you’ll allow me something of an indulgence, I’d like to talk to you about what’s really important.

      I didn’t go to the Chelsea game. I haven’t seen the game, neither live nor on Match of the Day. I haven’t seen the goals, I haven’t seen any match reports, haven’t followed the obvious Twitter explosion (a nailed on penalty apparently?) and haven’t read any of the undoubtedly fine analysis on this site.

      I was supposed to be there. Main Stand, my Dad’s season ticket. My brothers, Keith and Kevin, were supposed to be on The Kop. They weren’t. We didn’t sell our tickets on, didn’t pass them to our mates; there were three empty seats at Anfield on Saturday.

      We spent Saturday and Friday and most of Sunday in Fazakerley Hospital with our Dad and a great deal of extended family and on Sunday, as our Keith put it: “on a sunny Sunday Liverpool afternoon, at two minutes past two, our Father and best mate passed away.”

      Robert Salmon –– Bob, Bobby to his brothers, sisters and workmates –– Dad, was born in 1935. 20th of Feb 1935. 79 years old, going to the match since the 50s. A season-ticket holder for nearly 60 years. He’d seen it all. He’d seen some rubbish in the early days, the second division days, but he’d seen the glory. He saw Shankly build a team, he saw Shankly build HIS team, the team we were given, the team we follow. He saw the birth of all we hold dear, he saw the empire start. He named me for two of the foundation stones of the empire, he named his first son for the men who built the glory.

      He holidayed in Butlins in Pwllheli in (1960 I think), impressed by the fact that Jimmy Melia and Bobby Campbell and Johnny Morrisey were holidaying there. The fact that he and his friends were also associating with a singer called Rory Storm was less notable. Rory’s drummer was even less noted. Lad called Ringo.

      He was there in ’65 at Wembley when we brought home that first FA Cup; that holy cup, the one that started everything, the one we’d wanted for so long. He was there when the lads still went the match in suits and overcoats. When they went to the match in overcoats in May.

      He was there at the semi final when there was a pitch invasion, when the last whistle brought a joyous pitch invasion with the knowledge that Wembley beckoned. All the time that our Father stood as a role model for us we knew that he’d kept the copy of the Echo that contained a photo that featured him as a member of the army that invaded the pitch. We loved him all the more for that. One of the many, many things that we loved him for.

      He did the homes, he did the aways. With his mates, with our Uncles; Lenny, Dave, Jimmy. With his mates. He did the hard miles in the years before motorways. Sunderland in winter without motorways? He did 74 to watch us ram Supermac’s words down his throat. He did the leagues, all those leagues, all those glorious leagues that we took as birthright, he saw them all. He saw such things, such wonders. He saw the glory which was Rome. He stayed sober for three days (he always claimed he did anyway) in order that he could see the city and enjoy the city. He ate nothing but ice cream for three days because he was a simple Liverpool lad; an Everton-born Liverpool lad who didn’t trust that fancy foreign food. When he found a menu which contained the word ‘spaghetti’ (which one would imagine would be plentiful in that particular city) he ordered it and was amazed at ‘this white stuff’ that arrived having fully expected it to be of the tinned Heinz variety. That’s what he told us, we believed him, you believe your Dad on these things.

      Bruges in 78 by boat. Back by boat. Nearly back to Bruges by boat. The ‘no-drinking’ concept firmly abandoned, he had decided to get back on the boat to (and I quote) ‘thank the captain for a nice ride.’

      He drank in the Park Hotel in Netherton after home games in the 70s and 80s. Drank with Roy Evans and Ronnie Moran and Ronnie Whelan and Ian Rush and that period of stardom and greatness (and if the dates are wrong or the players were others then it’s because the legend has become bigger in my mind ––Evo’s a definite though).

      Paris. Three European Cups. He was at three European Cup wins. Not bad that, is it? Not many teams can do that can they? And he’s one of so many that can claim that. His story, his footballing story, is the same as yours, or your Dad’s or your Granddad’s, it’s what we all share, it’s what unites every one of us. My Dad was one of us. Unique and wonderful and brilliant and one of us, one of this big thing that we all have in common. In love with the game, in love with the club.

      He was at Hillsborough. He was in the stand and he watched as the stretchers came past, powerless to do anything and waiting to see if the next one had either Keith or Kevin on it. He was lucky. We were lucky. Our family came home but he knew how close it could have been, knew how lucky we were. He didn’t talk about what he saw, we didn’t discuss the details very often. One of the guys that went there on the coach that my Dad went on was one of the 96. The coach waited, had to leave without him, had to come back not knowing. We don’t know who it was. When the phone call came through that evening that told him that it was the first time that I’d ever seen my Father cry.

      And he brought us up on this club that he loved, this game that he loved. The three of us. Keith and Kevin before me. I came to the game relatively late on but I got there. Late 70s, through the 80s, educated the right way. The Paddock first. For us. Back when it was a big gap between the main stand and the pitch. Then the Kop. But he was the Main Stand. As long as I can remember, the Main Stand. Where the grown ups sit. I’m older now than he was then but the Main Stand is where the grown ups sit. I’m not a grown up, I never will be. At heart I don’t think he was either. But he was Main Stand and we were Kop. And we’d go together and we’d split up when we got there and we’d agree one thing, always one thing (and this is where the tears start) “We’ll meet you at the wall after the match”.

      The wall. Facing the corner where the The Kop and The Main Stand meet. That’s where we’d meet them; my Dad, Lenny, my Granddad (his best mates, reunited with his best mates now), we’d meet them by the wall. Gone now. Gone for years, replaced by a fence but still it was “We’ll meet you by the wall”. The fence has gone now, it’s just ground waiting for the expansion but we were “meeting by the wall” up until about a month ago when Dad became too weak to go anymore.

      Walking had been an issue for a while but he’d done his damnedest to keep going. We hoped for more, hoped to get him to the game, hoped for the Madrid game, for possibly one last big European night, spoke to the club, asked if we could arrange to bring him in a wheelchair, get him to his seat, store the chair somewhere (they offered up a space under the Kop, they were as excellent as you’d want them to be) and get back to him at the end of the game.

      But he was too tired and the weather was foul and it was cold. It didn’t happen. Chelsea maybe? Maybe we could get him to the Chelsea game? He had oxygen at home, if we could get a portable version? If we could find a space where he could watch from the wheelchair?

      We didn’t get to ask the question. He was hospitalised a week before the Chelsea game and on the day before the match he started to go downhill.

      So we didn’t go the game. We didn’t see the coverage, we didn’t watch Match of the Day. We possibly never will because, whatever happened in the game, it doesn’t really matter.

      I found out a few years ago that my Dad’s ambition had been to be a sports journalist. I’ve somehow, luckily, in a pretty unlikely turn of events, managed to do some of what he wanted to do. I’m delighted by that fact. Delighted, proud and comforted. Something of him is here, always here, in my opinions, in the way I voice them, in the fact that I do it at all. In the fact that I go to the game.

      My Dad’s story is the same as yours, as your Dad’s as your Granddad’s as all of us. One of the many thousands of us whose name you never know but you might have passed by as you walk to your seat or in the street before the game. I’m lucky enough to be able to tell you it here because of everything he gave me. Because of the love and the passion and the allegiance and the faith in the team.

      I hope I’ve done him some justice here, I’ve not even covered the things that made him truly special; they’re unique and indescribable. His fight to stay with us over the last three days has been immense and inspirational. It allowed us all to say our goodbyes, to tell him how much he was loved. And God he was loved. By so many people. He was that most wonderful of things; a truly good man.

      As we were with him we played him You’ll Never Walk Alone. Twice on that last morning. A song to support him, to let him know that we were there, to let him know that he wasn’t alone. He knew. He wasn’t. He was never alone. The Palace game is going to be difficult, I may not be able to handle the minutes before kick off. It’s always an emotional song, obviously it’s always an emotional song, this time it’s going to be a million times more powerful. This time it’s for my Dad, for every time from now on, it’s for my Dad.

      We told him this. And we told him one other thing. One of the last things that we told him; to let him know that we know we’ll see him again, to let him know that he’ll see his friends again, those that went before him who he’d missed and whose lives had contained as much of the passion for this great thing that we all share as his had.

      We told him this:

      “We’ll meet you by the wall after the match.”

      And we will.

      Good night, Dad.

      YNWA.


      Thanks for sharing that mate. That read was quite simply brilliant.

      When i was growing up i spent a lot of time with my Dadcu (grandfather) and he told me hundreds of stories (trust me on this, that is not an exaggeration) about his rugby days. Working down the mine on a Saturday morning and then playing in the afternoon etc. I just hung on his every word and would listen to him for hours and hours. Even to this day whenever i'm in a pub with my mates i'll always end up sitting with the older men and listening to their tales of mischief and woe. So much respect for my elders, proper hard men and women who just got on with it and never complained. The true core of our society.

      Hope everything goes well for your father mate and as last time, make sure you pass on mine and my family's best wishes to your father and family too.

      All the best for tomorrow, our thoughts are with you and yours.
      what-a-hit-son
      • LFC Reds Subscriber
      • ******
      • Started Topic
      • 16,466 posts | 4816 
      • t: @MrPrice1979 i: @klmprice101518
      Re: Writing about Liverpool Football Club
      Reply #10: Nov 14, 2014 08:16:36 am
      Thanks for sharing that mate. That read was quite simply brilliant.

      When i was growing up i spent a lot of time with my Dadcu (grandfather) and he told me hundreds of stories (trust me on this, that is not an exaggeration) about his rugby days. Working down the mine on a Saturday morning and then playing in the afternoon etc. I just hung on his every word and would listen to him for hours and hours. Even to this day whenever i'm in a pub with my mates i'll always end up sitting with the older men and listening to their tales of mischief and woe. So much respect for my elders, proper hard men and women who just got on with it and never complained. The true core of our society.

      Hope everything goes well for your father mate and as last time, make sure you pass on mine and my family's best wishes to your father and family too.

      All the best for tomorrow, our thoughts are with you and yours.

      Cheers mate, much appreciated. All went well so we're hopefully nearing the end of this.

      Thanks to everyone who passed on their regards. Really appreciated.
      Beerbelly
      • Banned
      • *****

      • 6,983 posts | 2054 
      Re: Writing about Liverpool Football Club
      Reply #11: Nov 14, 2014 08:41:30 am
      Brought a tear to my eye this.

      I take my Dad to Arrowe Park Hospital for his last operation early tomorrow from his battle with bowel  and liver cancer so this really touched me.

      By the way Ian, if you ever read this, you really have done him proud, believe me.

      God bless your family and may your old man never walk alone.


      We'll meet you by the wall after the match
      By IAN SALMON

      IF you’ll allow me something of an indulgence, I’d like to talk to you about what’s really important.

      I didn’t go to the Chelsea game. I haven’t seen the game, neither live nor on Match of the Day. I haven’t seen the goals, I haven’t seen any match reports, haven’t followed the obvious Twitter explosion (a nailed on penalty apparently?) and haven’t read any of the undoubtedly fine analysis on this site.

      I was supposed to be there. Main Stand, my Dad’s season ticket. My brothers, Keith and Kevin, were supposed to be on The Kop. They weren’t. We didn’t sell our tickets on, didn’t pass them to our mates; there were three empty seats at Anfield on Saturday.

      We spent Saturday and Friday and most of Sunday in Fazakerley Hospital with our Dad and a great deal of extended family and on Sunday, as our Keith put it: “on a sunny Sunday Liverpool afternoon, at two minutes past two, our Father and best mate passed away.”

      Robert Salmon –– Bob, Bobby to his brothers, sisters and workmates –– Dad, was born in 1935. 20th of Feb 1935. 79 years old, going to the match since the 50s. A season-ticket holder for nearly 60 years. He’d seen it all. He’d seen some rubbish in the early days, the second division days, but he’d seen the glory. He saw Shankly build a team, he saw Shankly build HIS team, the team we were given, the team we follow. He saw the birth of all we hold dear, he saw the empire start. He named me for two of the foundation stones of the empire, he named his first son for the men who built the glory.

      He holidayed in Butlins in Pwllheli in (1960 I think), impressed by the fact that Jimmy Melia and Bobby Campbell and Johnny Morrisey were holidaying there. The fact that he and his friends were also associating with a singer called Rory Storm was less notable. Rory’s drummer was even less noted. Lad called Ringo.

      He was there in ’65 at Wembley when we brought home that first FA Cup; that holy cup, the one that started everything, the one we’d wanted for so long. He was there when the lads still went the match in suits and overcoats. When they went to the match in overcoats in May.

      He was there at the semi final when there was a pitch invasion, when the last whistle brought a joyous pitch invasion with the knowledge that Wembley beckoned. All the time that our Father stood as a role model for us we knew that he’d kept the copy of the Echo that contained a photo that featured him as a member of the army that invaded the pitch. We loved him all the more for that. One of the many, many things that we loved him for.

      He did the homes, he did the aways. With his mates, with our Uncles; Lenny, Dave, Jimmy. With his mates. He did the hard miles in the years before motorways. Sunderland in winter without motorways? He did 74 to watch us ram Supermac’s words down his throat. He did the leagues, all those leagues, all those glorious leagues that we took as birthright, he saw them all. He saw such things, such wonders. He saw the glory which was Rome. He stayed sober for three days (he always claimed he did anyway) in order that he could see the city and enjoy the city. He ate nothing but ice cream for three days because he was a simple Liverpool lad; an Everton-born Liverpool lad who didn’t trust that fancy foreign food. When he found a menu which contained the word ‘spaghetti’ (which one would imagine would be plentiful in that particular city) he ordered it and was amazed at ‘this white stuff’ that arrived having fully expected it to be of the tinned Heinz variety. That’s what he told us, we believed him, you believe your Dad on these things.

      Bruges in 78 by boat. Back by boat. Nearly back to Bruges by boat. The ‘no-drinking’ concept firmly abandoned, he had decided to get back on the boat to (and I quote) ‘thank the captain for a nice ride.’

      He drank in the Park Hotel in Netherton after home games in the 70s and 80s. Drank with Roy Evans and Ronnie Moran and Ronnie Whelan and Ian Rush and that period of stardom and greatness (and if the dates are wrong or the players were others then it’s because the legend has become bigger in my mind ––Evo’s a definite though).

      Paris. Three European Cups. He was at three European Cup wins. Not bad that, is it? Not many teams can do that can they? And he’s one of so many that can claim that. His story, his footballing story, is the same as yours, or your Dad’s or your Granddad’s, it’s what we all share, it’s what unites every one of us. My Dad was one of us. Unique and wonderful and brilliant and one of us, one of this big thing that we all have in common. In love with the game, in love with the club.

      He was at Hillsborough. He was in the stand and he watched as the stretchers came past, powerless to do anything and waiting to see if the next one had either Keith or Kevin on it. He was lucky. We were lucky. Our family came home but he knew how close it could have been, knew how lucky we were. He didn’t talk about what he saw, we didn’t discuss the details very often. One of the guys that went there on the coach that my Dad went on was one of the 96. The coach waited, had to leave without him, had to come back not knowing. We don’t know who it was. When the phone call came through that evening that told him that it was the first time that I’d ever seen my Father cry.

      And he brought us up on this club that he loved, this game that he loved. The three of us. Keith and Kevin before me. I came to the game relatively late on but I got there. Late 70s, through the 80s, educated the right way. The Paddock first. For us. Back when it was a big gap between the main stand and the pitch. Then the Kop. But he was the Main Stand. As long as I can remember, the Main Stand. Where the grown ups sit. I’m older now than he was then but the Main Stand is where the grown ups sit. I’m not a grown up, I never will be. At heart I don’t think he was either. But he was Main Stand and we were Kop. And we’d go together and we’d split up when we got there and we’d agree one thing, always one thing (and this is where the tears start) “We’ll meet you at the wall after the match”.

      The wall. Facing the corner where the The Kop and The Main Stand meet. That’s where we’d meet them; my Dad, Lenny, my Granddad (his best mates, reunited with his best mates now), we’d meet them by the wall. Gone now. Gone for years, replaced by a fence but still it was “We’ll meet you by the wall”. The fence has gone now, it’s just ground waiting for the expansion but we were “meeting by the wall” up until about a month ago when Dad became too weak to go anymore.

      Walking had been an issue for a while but he’d done his damnedest to keep going. We hoped for more, hoped to get him to the game, hoped for the Madrid game, for possibly one last big European night, spoke to the club, asked if we could arrange to bring him in a wheelchair, get him to his seat, store the chair somewhere (they offered up a space under the Kop, they were as excellent as you’d want them to be) and get back to him at the end of the game.

      But he was too tired and the weather was foul and it was cold. It didn’t happen. Chelsea maybe? Maybe we could get him to the Chelsea game? He had oxygen at home, if we could get a portable version? If we could find a space where he could watch from the wheelchair?

      We didn’t get to ask the question. He was hospitalised a week before the Chelsea game and on the day before the match he started to go downhill.

      So we didn’t go the game. We didn’t see the coverage, we didn’t watch Match of the Day. We possibly never will because, whatever happened in the game, it doesn’t really matter.

      I found out a few years ago that my Dad’s ambition had been to be a sports journalist. I’ve somehow, luckily, in a pretty unlikely turn of events, managed to do some of what he wanted to do. I’m delighted by that fact. Delighted, proud and comforted. Something of him is here, always here, in my opinions, in the way I voice them, in the fact that I do it at all. In the fact that I go to the game.

      My Dad’s story is the same as yours, as your Dad’s as your Granddad’s as all of us. One of the many thousands of us whose name you never know but you might have passed by as you walk to your seat or in the street before the game. I’m lucky enough to be able to tell you it here because of everything he gave me. Because of the love and the passion and the allegiance and the faith in the team.

      I hope I’ve done him some justice here, I’ve not even covered the things that made him truly special; they’re unique and indescribable. His fight to stay with us over the last three days has been immense and inspirational. It allowed us all to say our goodbyes, to tell him how much he was loved. And God he was loved. By so many people. He was that most wonderful of things; a truly good man.

      As we were with him we played him You’ll Never Walk Alone. Twice on that last morning. A song to support him, to let him know that we were there, to let him know that he wasn’t alone. He knew. He wasn’t. He was never alone. The Palace game is going to be difficult, I may not be able to handle the minutes before kick off. It’s always an emotional song, obviously it’s always an emotional song, this time it’s going to be a million times more powerful. This time it’s for my Dad, for every time from now on, it’s for my Dad.

      We told him this. And we told him one other thing. One of the last things that we told him; to let him know that we know we’ll see him again, to let him know that he’ll see his friends again, those that went before him who he’d missed and whose lives had contained as much of the passion for this great thing that we all share as his had.

      We told him this:

      “We’ll meet you by the wall after the match.”

      And we will.

      Good night, Dad.

      YNWA.


      Nice read. RIP Mr Salmon YNWA.

      Sorry to hear of your new WAHS, all the best to you and yours.
      what-a-hit-son
      • LFC Reds Subscriber
      • ******
      • Started Topic
      • 16,466 posts | 4816 
      • t: @MrPrice1979 i: @klmprice101518
      Re: Writing about Liverpool Football Club
      Reply #12: Nov 14, 2014 01:24:09 pm
      Nice read. RIP Mr Salmon YNWA.

      Sorry to hear of your new WAHS, all the best to you and yours.

      Ta la, much appreciated.

      But.....

      Nowt to be sorry for my mate, I'm with him in Hospital now waiting to take him home already which was a surprise. Everything has gone well so hopefully he'll get over this op and it'll all be over. At least they are the sounds that are getting made.

      Buzzing I am!
      FL Red
      • LFC Reds Subscriber
      • ******
      • 31,048 posts | 6293 
      Re: Writing about Liverpool Football Club
      Reply #13: Nov 14, 2014 04:24:22 pm
      Ta la, much appreciated.

      But.....

      Nowt to be sorry for my mate, I'm with him in Hospital now waiting to take him home already which was a surprise. Everything has gone well so hopefully he'll get over this op and it'll all be over. At least they are the sounds that are getting made.

      Buzzing I am!


      Good to hear! Take care of you and yours and thanks for posting that article. ;)
      what-a-hit-son
      • LFC Reds Subscriber
      • ******
      • Started Topic
      • 16,466 posts | 4816 
      • t: @MrPrice1979 i: @klmprice101518
      Re: Writing about Liverpool Football Club
      Reply #14: Nov 14, 2014 05:13:44 pm
      Good to hear! Take care of you and yours and thanks for posting that article. ;)

      Nice one FL
      Beerbelly
      • Banned
      • *****

      • 6,983 posts | 2054 
      Re: Writing about Liverpool Football Club
      Reply #15: Nov 14, 2014 09:40:34 pm
      Ta la, much appreciated.

      But.....

      Nowt to be sorry for my mate, I'm with him in Hospital now waiting to take him home already which was a surprise. Everything has gone well so hopefully he'll get over this op and it'll all be over. At least they are the sounds that are getting made.

      Buzzing I am!

       :gt-happyup:
      reddebs
      • "LFC Hipster"
      • Forum Legend - Paisley
      • *****

      • 17,980 posts | 2264 
      Re: Writing about Liverpool Football Club
      Reply #16: Nov 14, 2014 09:55:01 pm
      Ta la, much appreciated.

      But.....

      Nowt to be sorry for my mate, I'm with him in Hospital now waiting to take him home already which was a surprise. Everything has gone well so hopefully he'll get over this op and it'll all be over. At least they are the sounds that are getting made.

      Buzzing I am!


      Fantastic news that wahs great to hear mate  :gt-happyup:
      what-a-hit-son
      • LFC Reds Subscriber
      • ******
      • Started Topic
      • 16,466 posts | 4816 
      • t: @MrPrice1979 i: @klmprice101518
      Re: Writing about Liverpool Football Club
      Reply #17: Oct 05, 2015 11:16:26 am
      BRENDAN RODGERS SACKED: A REACTION - by Neil Atkinson

      http://www.theanfieldwrap.com/2015/10/brendan-rodgers-sacked-a-reaction/

      BY NEIL ATKINSON

      AFTER Liverpool beat West Ham United 2-1 at Upton Park on 6th April 2014 I recorded a show on top of the tower. While recording the show I was getting texts about where the drink was happening. The Saddle on Dale Street. I couldn’t believe it. With Steve Graves I walked across town. “I mean, it’s not a good pub this, Steve. There must be some mistake. Maybe it is a holding position boozer.” When we opened the door it hit us. The heat. The sweat. The glow, the effervescent glow of smiles on faces, the joy making the light shimmer. And the noise. The wall of noise. Adam Melia and his brother Daniel glorifying “This Is How We Do It” by Montell Jordan on the karaoke and an entire room of Liverpool supporters and lesbians chanting the chorus back at them. South Central does it like nobody does. People on tables, roaring, laughing, dancing, carousing.

      This was the happiest I’ve ever been in my whole life.

      When Liverpool made Brendan Rodgers manager I didn’t really know what to think. Let’s see, I thought. Let’s just see. And, I thought, it’ll also be nice to have a manager I don’t wake up in the night anxious about, you know, like the bloke who nearly died or the bloke who fought for the soul of the club or the bloke who closer than anyone else alive personified the soul of the club. I thought maybe this will help. A bloke coming in from outside who no one knows much about. Someone not infected with our nonsense. Maybe he’ll get us playing. And if he doesn’t, well we just get rid of him. Which ever way it goes, it’ll be nice to get a full night’s sleep.

      In the February of his first season we went to Bray and the night before I spoke to Tony Evans and said I thought Rodgers might have to go in the summer. Just too inconsistent. Tony was adamant that he should be allowed three years. He talked me round.

      What transpired to be the key positive transfer window of Rodgers’s time had just happened. Liverpool had signed Phil Coutinho and Daniel Sturridge. The latter, especially, inspired an upturn in form and by the time the campaign had finished Liverpool had been able to look genuinely dangerous and had gone just shy of 2 points per game for the second half of the season.

      Rodgers then spent the summer highlighting the importance of improving the goals scored column but very few people anticipated what was to follow.
      Because of what has happened since Daniel Sturridge got injured on international duty in September 2014, the 2013/14 season has suffered a ton of revisionism. Hopefully now that Brendan Rodgers is no longer Liverpool manager that will stop and the most remarkable league season of my adulthood can be remembered for what it was. An incredible collective effort across the entire season that very nearly became Liverpool’s most remarkable title win since 1947 if not ever. Not one big push (Liverpool were top on Christmas Day) and not due solely to one player.

      Footballers will always be the most important part of any football team, especially across 38 games. In 13/14 Luis Suarez was remarkable. From having been desperate to leave he was entirely committed and played the best football of his Liverpool career by a mile. His form from October to December was the finest sustained spell I’ve ever seen any Liverpool player hit. After the turn of the year he dropped off a couple of rungs to being simply incredible.

      But he wasn’t the sole reason for Liverpool’s success, the season before had shown the way. Rodgers brought the best out of both Suarez and Sturridge, he gave them able support in Gerrard, Henderson and Sterling from whom he also coaxed the very best and he committed wholeheartedly to an attacking approach which allowed all to shine and Liverpool perpetually improved. If you take any run of 5 games from when Rodgers arrived in 2012 up to when Gerrard fell over the performances, results or both were better than any other given 5. This, more than anything, is indicative of Brendan Rodgers’s remarkable abilities as a coach. This, more than anything, marks him down as the sort of momentum manager which would be part of this eventual failure at Liverpool. No backward steps wasn’t just an attitude, it was a lifeblood and since they were taken Liverpool haven’t been able to stride freely again.

      Rodgers created something which could be got behind. Liverpool were about something in a way they arguably hadn’t been since September 2009. In the first month of Rodgers’s reign John Henry was having to pen open letters to the support. The stench of Hicks and Gillett, Purslow and Hodgson, and yes, in part, Parry and Moores still lingered about the place and even Kenny Dalglish hadn’t been able to wipe it clean and him being sacked had dirtied the place up again.

      Liverpool’s football was zipless, seamless, mustard. The approach, watching young lads play and play and play, lightened everyone’s mood. Lightened everyone’s life. The purpose of the enterprise suddenly back.

      Liverpool Football Club was suddenly unfettered.

      For too long, since 2007, possibly 2005 and perhaps even before then, Liverpool Football Club had been fettered. Supporting Liverpool, going the game, talking about the game had been to have an argument, a perpetual argument. Over ownership, finances, protests, Benitez, our place in the world and our direction of travel. Supporting Liverpool had been supporting a thoroughbred race horse beladen with baggage. Suddenly, through the approach of Rodgers and his men, as much as anything else, that baggage had gone and the horse was striding.

      Suddenly everywhere you went in the city, everyone you spoke to, everything that happened had a buzz. Everyone was talking football, talking The Reds. It helped that Everton were playing well too. The whole city was alive with the sound of togger.

      Suddenly Liverpool was having a pint. Even more of a pint than normal. The Saddle tableau wasn’t unique. All over the city parties were being had every weekend. Boss were putting on Boss Nights which were boss. The whole city bounced to the weekend’s rhythm, boozers packed for almost every game which had any sort of an impact at the top, boozers spilling over before, during and after when The Reds played. This wasn’t limited just to the city of Liverpool. The worldwide diaspora were going out and watching it together. Suddenly it was football that made you want to be with your mates, football that made you want to make new mates. Because these Reds.

      Suddenly it was a joy to be alive.

      It is important not to forget what 13/14 felt like. There is a history of football which is handed down to us through record books and television. It’s a history which is predominantly written by the greybearded and the distant and by the cynics. Some of these dwell within our own parish, a darkness in their souls uncleansed, consistently unable to forgive Brendan Rodgers for not being the bloke who nearly died or the bloke who fought for the soul of the club or the bloke who closer than anyone else alive personified the soul of the club.

      For many of these the hard facts of the matter will always prevail. Hard facts can’t dance. Hard facts have no rhythm. No one wants to get off with hard facts. The football history that really matters is about the stories, the collective experience, the days and the nights, the coaches and the buzz. Remember not the hard fact of the 3-3 draw, your side losing a three goal lead, but instead remember that they were trying to score ten. Remember they were trying to do the impossible. Remember how proud you were of how close they came.

      And at Liverpool, there are others factors, other issues. Those who can’t get beyond having seen behind the curtain, can’t get beyond the backroom and the gossip, can’t get beyond what has gone before. Football minds melded beyond what happens on the green thing to obsess only over what happens everywhere else. I know this. It’s hard to get your innocence back. I recognise that. Because that is 2008/09.

      Liverpool’s title charge in 2008/09 mostly wasn’t an enjoyable experience. It was fraught. It was stressful. It was about sticking it to people. Not about the adventure and not even really about sticking it to people who didn’t support Liverpool. It was about sticking it to people internally. It’s an amazing thoroughbred, Benitez’s 08/09, because it was carrying all sorts. Mostly weaponry either stuck in it or thrusting weaponry back. Even now too much of Liverpool’s support is about sticking it to people internally.

      I’d never go back to 08/09. Not for a second. Not for a moment. Not even for 1-4 at Old Trafford. It was thoroughly unpleasant, waking at 3am wondering if tomorrow is the day Benitez ridiculously gets sacked, arguing in the ground every other week. But I’d do 13/14 again, knowing what I know now. I’d live that nine months over and over and over again if I could. Groundhog season. No one was looking to stick anything to anyone. Not when you could give them a cuddle instead. I’d go back in an instant, back to waking at 3am excited that it is Saturday Saturday Saturday. I’d go back in the blink of an eye. I’d do it mostly so I could see my friends that happy again, faces moist with sweat, improbability and delight.
      —
      On the 20th September 2014 Liverpool returned to Upton Park. Liverpool played the diamond. Borini and Balotelli up front, a million miles from Suarez and Sturridge. Gerrard dominated by Downing, a million miles from the previous season. Liverpool beaten. Liverpool broken. And from that point Liverpool have been nothing but fettered.

      Brendan Rodgers can point to external factors. The loss of Sturridge on England duty arguably hurt more than the loss of Suarez but both together was a bitter blow. The reality of extra games meant there had to be an influx of new players and it can’t be underestimated what the run in 13/14 did to the footballers – no one has managed to retain the title this decade and most defences have been very poor. Liverpool didn’t have the depth or the experience of the other three sides that have competed for the title in the last five years; what they did have was the emotional energy. And if that turns


      Yet there was more than just that wrong. It seemed the greybearded, the distant, the cynical had got to Rodgers and Liverpool. From a clear, stated commitment to add to the goals scored column in the summer 2013 Liverpool had manifestly gone into reverse. The backwards steps had been taken too early, they were there in the summer with talk of consolidation before Daniel Sturridge gets his knock. And Rodgers himself seemed like a man who had to prove he was a responsible leader, not a manager who just sent lads out to rip into teams, spoke like he felt had to add more steel. More substance. Martin Fitzgerald likened Liverpool of 2014/15 to a band who made a terrific punkpop debut album but who are looking for a more grown-up follow up, looking for less dancing and better reviews in the broadsheets before releasing something turgid, something the broadsheets wouldn’t applaud and something leaving fans of the band wondering what on earth had gone on – can you just play it faster?

      The desire for mainstream acceptance, the startling drop off in quality in attack and the collective physical and mental exhaustion after 13/14 did for Rodgers. He struggled to get his side going and then when he finally did, when they got on their run, it was when they got off it that the rot for his reputation set in. If he wasn’t a man fighting with himself at the start of 14/15 he most definitely was by the end and the thing about fighting with yourself is that you will always lose.

      Liverpool lost. They lost and lost and lost. United, Arsenal and Villa with its three formations in forty five minutes, showing a manager unsure of his team, unsure of himself. Crystal Palace. And then Stoke. In many sense Stoke was the final straw – how can you trust the man who oversees losing 6-1? For those who were there Stoke would live long in the memory. What do you do about that? How do you rebuild those bridges?

      Rodgers kept his job and he tried – this season started with three consecutive clean sheets but then West Ham happened and West Ham looked so much like Crystal Palace. And if Crystal Palace can happen again, then can Stoke?

      In the end Rodgers stayed for only eight league games too long. To have removed him from his post earlier than Stoke away would have been very harsh on the man who managed the side to the most unlikely title challenge since Abramovitch turned up. To have kept him beyond that point now feels tougher on him than on us, frankly, and points are on the board.
      —
      What have we learnt? That our darkness, that our nonsense can infect anyone? That the job is a very hard job indeed? That we want/need everything, all the everythings, more than one man can provide? Perhaps. But why dwell there? That’s one for another day.

      The key aspect of Brendan Rodgers’s reign as Liverpool manager is that he came closest to doing what has become structurally more and more difficult since 1990. Closer than the bloke who nearly died or the bloke who fought for the soul of the club or the bloke who closer than anyone else alive personified the soul of the club. And he came closest to doing it in the most electrifying, high wire act way that none of them could have done, that perhaps no one else in the world would have done.

      I’ve learnt to love footballers again under Brendan Rodgers, because at his best he so clearly does. Footballers doing amazing things, making children of us, is a wonderful thing. Learnt that goals are paramount to proceedings and learnt that without them nothing can be achieved. These might seem like straightforward and obvious enough virtues but it had been a dark place for far too long.

      It is time he goes because Hope has gone and he’s shown what Hope can do. Hope and her responsible elder brother Belief, her irrepressible younger brother Delusion. This is the holy trinity that any future Liverpool success will be built on and so I’ll say it now: I believe the next Liverpool manager whoever he will be will win the league. You should too. Because if you don’t what’s the point of it all?

      Regardless though, this is for tomorrow. For today, I can close my eyes and see Sturridge juggling it on the goalline against Stoke, Steve Graves on Gibbo’s shoulders after Arsenal, Henderson forcing it in against Swansea. I can see Skrtel rising against Arsenal, Mike Nevin falling off the kerb hectoring me after West Ham, Flanagan rattling into Soldado.

      Gerrard with his top off against Fulham, Gerrard with his top off against Fulham, Gerrard with his top off against Fulham.

      It can’t be taken away and it emerges in odd places. If I ever need to think of 13/14 I put on “I’m On My Way” by The Proclaimers and think of Ben Johnson and Adam Melia singing it after one of the wins, nailing it, absolutely perfect in every sense:
      I’m on my way from misery to happiness today
      I’m on my way from misery to happiness today
      I’m on my way to what I want from this world
      And years from now you’ll make it to the next world
      And everything that you receive up yonder
      Is what you gave to me the day I wandered

      At Glastonbury last year we went to see The Proclaimers all together and they played it. I took this photo of Adam and Ben singing along:
      Just look at them there. It’s Suarez hitting the post against Arsenal isn’t it? The best twenty minutes of your life.

      These are my memories. If you were doing 13/14 right, you’ll have your own, your own photographs, your own stories, your own moments. (If you weren’t doing 13/14 right, you’ll probably be wondering when I’m going to mention defending). You’ll know immediately the ones I mean and you’ll be able to substitute in your own. You’ll have everything and you’ll know that those days couldn’t have happened without Brendan Rodgers.

      It was the happiest I’ve been in my whole life.

      All the best, Brendan. All the best.
      what-a-hit-son
      • LFC Reds Subscriber
      • ******
      • Started Topic
      • 16,466 posts | 4816 
      • t: @MrPrice1979 i: @klmprice101518
      Re: Writing about Liverpool Football Club
      Reply #18: Nov 10, 2015 06:16:09 am
      The Trouble With Anfield
 Is Me

      By @thecenci


      ‘The word fanatic has been used many times. I think it’s more than fanaticism. It’s a religion to them. The thousands who come here come to worship, it’s a sort of shrine, it isn’t a football ground.’
      – Bill Shankly

      Makes you think, doesn’t it?

      Last season, I took my niece to her first ever Liverpool game. She was 15, not especially interested in Liverpool or, indeed, football, but had heard of the Kop and wanted to see what it was like. There was also something to do with Daniel Sturridge too but I didn’t examine that motive too intently. Anyway, she enjoyed the day, enjoyed torturing me with her music on the drive back and said she would like to go back ‘at some point.’ Not exactly commitment.

      Anfield Me.

      I have other friends who have been to one game too – just to see what it’s like. They’ve nodded around the stands, sang You’ll Never Walk Alone, sat through the game and gone home with a tick on the Bucket List.  Anfield – done.

      Anfield is something to see at least once.

      The ground itself usually takes people by surprise. It’s smaller than most others. Very compact with the front rows being mere metres from the pitch. The players can hear you. I can testify that, following one goalless and soulless draw against Birmingham, John Arne Riise could here every word I gave him as he trotted over for an ill-advised round of applause. I won’t repeat them here. Not due to the expletive count on this site, but as they soon lost their structure as individual words and ended up in some sort of jam of vowels as I shrieked at his careworn face. What I gained in passion I lost in coherence.

      Anfield is also beautiful. I never want to leave there and fought against the ‘but we need to compete’ and ‘if it were up to people like you we’d still be in 1892 in front of ten people and a dog’ crowd when it looked like we were moving across Anfield Road. On European nights it’s unrivaled and the envy of the continent, but it’s not just the sight of the place, it’s the feel of it too. On its good days nothing can generate that intangible sense of greatness, of difference, of, well, Liverpool. It gets into your bones. When Anfield shakes, so does the world.

      But it’s not always like that. In fact it’s seldom like that. Nowadays, we turn up, we watch, we go home again as we would a night out at the pictures. People blame each other for this but sometimes the crowd just aren’t arsed. The frowns when someone starts singing on their own. The snickering when no one joins in. The ‘Jesus, lad. It’s only Bournemouth, not Real Madrid’ when someone goes off on one. We sit and watch and wait and wonder where the atmosphere has gone.

      And you know who’s to blame for this? You are. Not me. You.

      Well, alright, me too.

      There are times when people just aren’t up for it. Pre-match drinking can either leave you buoyant or sluggish depending on your ABV capacity. It’s also very difficult to go into full on histrionics when Stoke City are standing in front of you and you’re dying for a piss. It’s equally tricky when you’re looking at another cross float harmlessly into the stand or the back four are passing it round at 0-0 with ten to go. Atmosphere isn’t always easy and not everyone can get one going. I can’t.

      Anfield now has a singing section. I was against the idea of that at the time. Well, not against as such. More ‘embarrassed’. The whole ground should be singing, not just those standing at the back of the Kop. It’s great singing away and pausing to realise that, yes, even the Main Stand is doing it too. (For those who don’t know, the Main Stand is famed for, shall we say, less than enthusiastic people who prefers tartan blankets to scarves and colours. I love it) A singing section seemed like an acknowledgement of failure throughout the ground. ‘We have to do something.’ I feel differently now. It’s become a focal point so when Blocks 305 and 306 get going elements of the Kop look around and join in.

      Sometimes.

      A mate of mine calls the average Anfield patron ‘atmosphere voyeurs’. A photo here, a video there but nothing like actually joining in. We’ve all stood next to people who take photos of every corner and we’ve all frowned at them at some point. Live and let live and all that but I did bring this up with someone who had clearly travelled thousands of miles to watch Steven Gerrard score a penalty through the lens of his video camera rather than jerk his head around to watch the real man do the real thing. Each to their own, obviously, but it can detract from the atmosphere if whole blocks are basically watching telly.

      This is not to criticise our global support (I’ve co-edited a book about it after all (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Were-Everywhere-Us-Liverpools-Through/dp/1785310429  at somewhere between ÂŁ9 and ÂŁ12 with an introduction from John Barnes. Yes, John Barnes!) – or those who want to take keepsakes of that famous square of grass, but by not joining in (or being too scared to join in) the thing that makes Anfield a great Anfield is somehow reduced a notch. That fear thing is as real as it is stupid. That worry that you may not be doing the right thing is ludicrous. I’ve had two instances of this. At the Arsenal Champions League game in 2008 some dickhead told me ‘not to come here again’ after I advised Dirk Kuyt to try passing it to one of our lads this time. I went nose to nose with him, calculating that I’d been in the ground hundreds of times before his own Dad had even considered having children so he had no right to advise me on my level of support, but that all went nice once we scored and I got to jump on his back in the celebration. The other time was against West Ham years ago when again I was keen to provide some feedback or other. The lad next to me was about to square up to me before he inexplicably looked at my footwear (Adidas Samba), nodded and silently decided that my point was valid. Absolutely ridiculous.

      If you’ve not been to the ground very often you may not always know what to do so you stay quiet. The noise quotient is thus further reduced.

      Incidentally, he could have battered me so I’m glad I left the K-Swiss at home.

      So we’re all to blame to some degree. Those who want everyone to sing don’t always want everyone to join in. No one wants to see Soccer A.M seal claps on the Kop.

      There’s someone else to blame too.

      Those other lads.

      Yes, them.

      This is a symbiotic process. They play well and do great things – we sing them home and everything is great. They do whatever Dejan did last week and the crowd are too fu**ed off to get involved. If we know we’re clearly the better side and this is going to be great then we’re all up for it. If we don’t, we don’t. Look at 13-14. In the early months, specifically Palace at home, it sounded like the entire ground was collectively doing a crossword such was the quiet mumbling around the place. Fast forward a few months to the Tottenham game and minutes before the teams come out when, for absolutely no reason, the entire ground just decided to roar. There aren’t many league games where that happens but that minute will always stay with me. As one we decided to just roar as we knew what was coming. You’re getting battered today, lads. Absolutely battered. And we’re part of it. Two minutes into game we were a goal up and Roberto Soldado was looking to get off the pitch as soon as possible.

      But if that doesn’t happen, if Liverpool are either struggling or underwhelming, that atmosphere dissipates. This isn’t a recent thing. It’s a myth that the Anfield of the 70s and 80s always resembled the St Etienne game. Often as not crowds were low and singing was at a premium. My first ever game in November 1981 was almost silent. A case of ‘come on then, show us something.’ They did too. They showed us a 1-0 defeat.

      Things became really bad during the Hodgson tenure. Red was at war with Red. Some wanted Rafa gone and openly celebrated the decision to let him go while others pointed at the pitch, at Cole and Konchesky and reminded others of being careful what you wish for. Hodgson’s last home game against Bolton saw a crowd of just 35,400 and people still sat down when we scored the winner in injury time. No one cared until things changed.

      The same can be said today albeit it not of Hodgson proportions. Ours is a fractured fanbase and has been since 2008. For every anti-Brendan shout there are equal zealots in the other camp. During the Arsenal game I tweeted that the first half was the best we’d played in 15 months. Two people instantly accused me of not backing the manager. Even praise is taken poorly in some quarters. This constant need to berate others even when we’re doing well. I’ll never understand it.

      We all want Liverpool to do well, don’t we? Well, I’d say so but there’s the call for some people actively wanting us to fail to show that they were always right about the manager. That’s probably true in some cases but it does nothing to build up that bastion of invincibility that Shankly spoke of. We each mistrust the views or agenda of the other now. There was only the first few months of Kenny’s return and the last few months of 2013-14 that made Anfield a laugh again before even that was cleaved in two before too long.

      So, is Anfield dead?  No. It never can be as we have this unerring quality of self-surprise. I didn’t see ‘that’ season coming as much as I didn’t see that Arsenal performance coming, but gone are the days when atmosphere is guaranteed. It purely relies on how the team are doing now and that’s a real shame. Away games are different. Always funnier, always with a stronger sense of camaraderie and always, always, always louder. These days at least.

      But something has to change. If we can’t be arsed how can the players be? Yes, they earn billions and all that but it helps if they love their work too. Getting out and playing in front of a mardy gang of bas**rds isn’t going to help. Everyone needs to step up. Everyone needs to do a bit more. Everyone needs to make the match day interactive.

      Oh, and as if I’ve ever owned a pair of K-Swiss.

      http://anfieldindex.com/16756/trouble-with-anfield-is-me.html
      what-a-hit-son
      • LFC Reds Subscriber
      • ******
      • Started Topic
      • 16,466 posts | 4816 
      • t: @MrPrice1979 i: @klmprice101518
      Re: Writing about Liverpool Football Club
      Reply #19: Nov 10, 2015 12:54:00 pm
      Brought a tear to my eye this.

      I take my Dad to Arrowe Park Hospital for his last operation early tomorrow from his battle with bowel  and liver cancer so this really touched me.

      By the way Ian, if you ever read this, you really have done him proud, believe me.

      God bless your family and may your old man never walk alone.


      We'll meet you by the wall after the match
      By IAN SALMON

      IF you’ll allow me something of an indulgence, I’d like to talk to you about what’s really important.

      I didn’t go to the Chelsea game. I haven’t seen the game, neither live nor on Match of the Day. I haven’t seen the goals, I haven’t seen any match reports, haven’t followed the obvious Twitter explosion (a nailed on penalty apparently?) and haven’t read any of the undoubtedly fine analysis on this site.

      I was supposed to be there. Main Stand, my Dad’s season ticket. My brothers, Keith and Kevin, were supposed to be on The Kop. They weren’t. We didn’t sell our tickets on, didn’t pass them to our mates; there were three empty seats at Anfield on Saturday.

      We spent Saturday and Friday and most of Sunday in Fazakerley Hospital with our Dad and a great deal of extended family and on Sunday, as our Keith put it: “on a sunny Sunday Liverpool afternoon, at two minutes past two, our Father and best mate passed away.”

      Robert Salmon –– Bob, Bobby to his brothers, sisters and workmates –– Dad, was born in 1935. 20th of Feb 1935. 79 years old, going to the match since the 50s. A season-ticket holder for nearly 60 years. He’d seen it all. He’d seen some rubbish in the early days, the second division days, but he’d seen the glory. He saw Shankly build a team, he saw Shankly build HIS team, the team we were given, the team we follow. He saw the birth of all we hold dear, he saw the empire start. He named me for two of the foundation stones of the empire, he named his first son for the men who built the glory.

      He holidayed in Butlins in Pwllheli in (1960 I think), impressed by the fact that Jimmy Melia and Bobby Campbell and Johnny Morrisey were holidaying there. The fact that he and his friends were also associating with a singer called Rory Storm was less notable. Rory’s drummer was even less noted. Lad called Ringo.

      He was there in ’65 at Wembley when we brought home that first FA Cup; that holy cup, the one that started everything, the one we’d wanted for so long. He was there when the lads still went the match in suits and overcoats. When they went to the match in overcoats in May.

      He was there at the semi final when there was a pitch invasion, when the last whistle brought a joyous pitch invasion with the knowledge that Wembley beckoned. All the time that our Father stood as a role model for us we knew that he’d kept the copy of the Echo that contained a photo that featured him as a member of the army that invaded the pitch. We loved him all the more for that. One of the many, many things that we loved him for.

      He did the homes, he did the aways. With his mates, with our Uncles; Lenny, Dave, Jimmy. With his mates. He did the hard miles in the years before motorways. Sunderland in winter without motorways? He did 74 to watch us ram Supermac’s words down his throat. He did the leagues, all those leagues, all those glorious leagues that we took as birthright, he saw them all. He saw such things, such wonders. He saw the glory which was Rome. He stayed sober for three days (he always claimed he did anyway) in order that he could see the city and enjoy the city. He ate nothing but ice cream for three days because he was a simple Liverpool lad; an Everton-born Liverpool lad who didn’t trust that fancy foreign food. When he found a menu which contained the word ‘spaghetti’ (which one would imagine would be plentiful in that particular city) he ordered it and was amazed at ‘this white stuff’ that arrived having fully expected it to be of the tinned Heinz variety. That’s what he told us, we believed him, you believe your Dad on these things.

      Bruges in 78 by boat. Back by boat. Nearly back to Bruges by boat. The ‘no-drinking’ concept firmly abandoned, he had decided to get back on the boat to (and I quote) ‘thank the captain for a nice ride.’

      He drank in the Park Hotel in Netherton after home games in the 70s and 80s. Drank with Roy Evans and Ronnie Moran and Ronnie Whelan and Ian Rush and that period of stardom and greatness (and if the dates are wrong or the players were others then it’s because the legend has become bigger in my mind ––Evo’s a definite though).

      Paris. Three European Cups. He was at three European Cup wins. Not bad that, is it? Not many teams can do that can they? And he’s one of so many that can claim that. His story, his footballing story, is the same as yours, or your Dad’s or your Granddad’s, it’s what we all share, it’s what unites every one of us. My Dad was one of us. Unique and wonderful and brilliant and one of us, one of this big thing that we all have in common. In love with the game, in love with the club.

      He was at Hillsborough. He was in the stand and he watched as the stretchers came past, powerless to do anything and waiting to see if the next one had either Keith or Kevin on it. He was lucky. We were lucky. Our family came home but he knew how close it could have been, knew how lucky we were. He didn’t talk about what he saw, we didn’t discuss the details very often. One of the guys that went there on the coach that my Dad went on was one of the 96. The coach waited, had to leave without him, had to come back not knowing. We don’t know who it was. When the phone call came through that evening that told him that it was the first time that I’d ever seen my Father cry.

      And he brought us up on this club that he loved, this game that he loved. The three of us. Keith and Kevin before me. I came to the game relatively late on but I got there. Late 70s, through the 80s, educated the right way. The Paddock first. For us. Back when it was a big gap between the main stand and the pitch. Then the Kop. But he was the Main Stand. As long as I can remember, the Main Stand. Where the grown ups sit. I’m older now than he was then but the Main Stand is where the grown ups sit. I’m not a grown up, I never will be. At heart I don’t think he was either. But he was Main Stand and we were Kop. And we’d go together and we’d split up when we got there and we’d agree one thing, always one thing (and this is where the tears start) “We’ll meet you at the wall after the match”.

      The wall. Facing the corner where the The Kop and The Main Stand meet. That’s where we’d meet them; my Dad, Lenny, my Granddad (his best mates, reunited with his best mates now), we’d meet them by the wall. Gone now. Gone for years, replaced by a fence but still it was “We’ll meet you by the wall”. The fence has gone now, it’s just ground waiting for the expansion but we were “meeting by the wall” up until about a month ago when Dad became too weak to go anymore.

      Walking had been an issue for a while but he’d done his damnedest to keep going. We hoped for more, hoped to get him to the game, hoped for the Madrid game, for possibly one last big European night, spoke to the club, asked if we could arrange to bring him in a wheelchair, get him to his seat, store the chair somewhere (they offered up a space under the Kop, they were as excellent as you’d want them to be) and get back to him at the end of the game.

      But he was too tired and the weather was foul and it was cold. It didn’t happen. Chelsea maybe? Maybe we could get him to the Chelsea game? He had oxygen at home, if we could get a portable version? If we could find a space where he could watch from the wheelchair?

      We didn’t get to ask the question. He was hospitalised a week before the Chelsea game and on the day before the match he started to go downhill.

      So we didn’t go the game. We didn’t see the coverage, we didn’t watch Match of the Day. We possibly never will because, whatever happened in the game, it doesn’t really matter.

      I found out a few years ago that my Dad’s ambition had been to be a sports journalist. I’ve somehow, luckily, in a pretty unlikely turn of events, managed to do some of what he wanted to do. I’m delighted by that fact. Delighted, proud and comforted. Something of him is here, always here, in my opinions, in the way I voice them, in the fact that I do it at all. In the fact that I go to the game.

      My Dad’s story is the same as yours, as your Dad’s as your Granddad’s as all of us. One of the many thousands of us whose name you never know but you might have passed by as you walk to your seat or in the street before the game. I’m lucky enough to be able to tell you it here because of everything he gave me. Because of the love and the passion and the allegiance and the faith in the team.

      I hope I’ve done him some justice here, I’ve not even covered the things that made him truly special; they’re unique and indescribable. His fight to stay with us over the last three days has been immense and inspirational. It allowed us all to say our goodbyes, to tell him how much he was loved. And God he was loved. By so many people. He was that most wonderful of things; a truly good man.

      As we were with him we played him You’ll Never Walk Alone. Twice on that last morning. A song to support him, to let him know that we were there, to let him know that he wasn’t alone. He knew. He wasn’t. He was never alone. The Palace game is going to be difficult, I may not be able to handle the minutes before kick off. It’s always an emotional song, obviously it’s always an emotional song, this time it’s going to be a million times more powerful. This time it’s for my Dad, for every time from now on, it’s for my Dad.

      We told him this. And we told him one other thing. One of the last things that we told him; to let him know that we know we’ll see him again, to let him know that he’ll see his friends again, those that went before him who he’d missed and whose lives had contained as much of the passion for this great thing that we all share as his had.

      We told him this:

      “We’ll meet you by the wall after the match.”

      And we will.

      Good night, Dad.

      YNWA.


      Bloody hell just read that piece again.

      Something in my eye...
      what-a-hit-son
      • LFC Reds Subscriber
      • ******
      • Started Topic
      • 16,466 posts | 4816 
      • t: @MrPrice1979 i: @klmprice101518
      Re: Writing about Liverpool Football Club
      Reply #20: Nov 29, 2015 09:04:13 pm
      PHILIPPE COUTINHO: THE MAN WHO ESCAPED PURGATORY
      MODERN FOOTBALL HAS CREATED A PURGATORY. A place where players are heralded as the next big thing – and who often fail to live up to the hype – are placed in. The lines between star and potential star are becoming increasingly blurred, meaning fans and clubs alike are impatient. They demand an instant impact and if you don’t deliver it’s a missed opportunity for the player, not the club. One player on the verge of escaping his personal limbo is Liverpool’s Philippe Coutinho.

      Philippe Coutinho Correia, the third, and youngest, son of José Carlos, was born on June 12, 1992, in Rio de Janiero and raised in the district of Rocha. A collection of small industrial warehouses was his humble childhood home.

      It was in this area that the future Brazil international learnt his craft. The concrete football pitch close by was his canvas and his elder brothers his inspiration; he would go on to express himself in that concrete jungle.

      Futsal was his game of choice and it wasn’t long before Philippe was getting the better of his elder brothers, Cristiano and Leandro. It also wasn’t long before clubs started taking note and he was asked to attend a trial for Vasco da Gama. It’s hard to imagine it now – the Liverpool number 10 often makes himself at home in some of England’s biggest stadiums – but on his first day he wouldn’t leave his father’s side and cried due to extreme shyness.

      Recalling his futsal years, Coutinho said: “I played futsal from the age of six. Then when I was seven I went to Vasco da Gama, I was playing futsal until I was 11 before I moved to the big pitch. This is where I learned my skills. When you play futsal, it is more technical and much quicker. The place where you play is much smaller and the pace quicker so you need to be a highly technical player to succeed. It helps me adapt quicker.”

      The futsal videos of a young Coutinho – ‘Philippinho’ as he was called back then – can be found on YouTube, with the curly haired maestro still using the same tricks when he plays now as he did back then. He’s a contortionist with the ball at his feet and a joy to watch. The twinkle in his eye and the cheeky smile he flashes after scoring is something Liverpool fans have become accustomed to.

      Coming through the youth ranks at Vasco he often crossed paths with another Brazilian starlet, Neymar. At the time the talk was about which of these two talented youngsters would be the best. The were likened to Robinho and Diego, two players that had some years earlier come through the ranks at Santos. Coutinho’s Vasco defeated Neymar’s Santos in the under-17 Copa do Brasil in 2008 and his star was on rapid ascent.

      Unsurprisingly with a profound South American talent, a move to Europe was just around the corner. Many clubs showed an interest but it was Italian side Inter Milan who took the calculated risk and paid Vasco da Gama €4 million for the services of Brazil’s next big thing.

      After just a few training sessions with Inter, manager at the time Rafa Benítez declared Coutinho would be “the club’s future”. Many will be familiar with the Inter-Tottenham Hotspur 4-3 match, it’s forever associated with Gareth Bale announcing himself to the world, but it was Inter Milan’s number 29 who impressed the football purists. The diminutive Brazilian played a part in two of the four Inter goals while playing on the left of a 4-2-3-1. A bright start at Inter soon faded, however; a mixture of injuries and the sacking of Benítez meant Coutinho finished the season out of the team.

      After failing to establish himself in the first half of 2011-12, Inter allowed Coutinho to be loaned to Spanish side Espanyol, who at the time had future Southampton and Spurs manager Mauricio Pochettino at the helm. The loan deal was the revival Coutinho’s stagnating career needed.

      A return of five goals in 16 appearances – and one of the goals of the season against Rayo Vallecano – led to Espanyol wanting to extend the loan but Inter were convinced of his quality once again and welcomed him back with open arms. Diego Milito, Inter’s leading marksman at the time, commented how “[Coutinho’s] time in Spain changed him for the better”. First team football will do that to a player. The first half of the next season he made 19 appearances for the side, just one shy of the total number he made in the entirety of 2010-11.

      In a bizarre twist he was sold to Liverpool in January 2013 for £8 million – many Nerazzurri fans questioning the wisdom of letting their best young talent leave on the cheap. The fee was too tempting, however, for the Inter Milan owners, who had grown tired of waiting to reap their rewards.

      Later, Inter Milan director Piero Ausilio noted his regret at letting Coutinho leave: “He was just 18 when he arrived at the club from Vasco. Then came [Rafa] Benítez and the expectations were very high. Rafa had used him on the flanks in a 4-2-3-1 formation but he was not playing much so we decided to sell him. I would like young players to grow and succeed here; when I see them play for other clubs, it makes me sad.”

      Inter’s loss was Liverpool’s gain. The mercurial mop-headed number 10 made himself at home in the Liverpool line-up, hitting it off instantly with Luis Suárez and Daniel Sturridge. Originally playing on the left of a 4-2-3-1 – like he had at Inter – his partnership with the latter blossomed in the absence of the former and he was instrumental in Liverpool’s emphatic end to the 2012-13 season.

      He was tormenting players and tying defenders in knots like a certain Cristiano Ronaldo was doing in his debut season at United, with the difference being the Liverpool player had an end product from day one. He’s a gifted player that turns heads and has warmed rival fans to his undoubted quality. He made HĂ©ctor BellerĂ­n do an impression of a dog chasing its own tail when Liverpool travelled to the Emirates in August 2015.

      The following season was one of two halves for both club and player: inconsistent in the first half of the season and magical in the second. The nimble playmaker had his position tweaked; he was deployed as a left-sided central midfielder as part of a diamond and he evolved beyond measure – reaching heights many thought he wouldn’t after his stagnation at Inter.

      The Brazilian attacking midfielder was now doing the dirty work in midfield against the likes of Yaya TourĂ© and Fernandinho. Crucially, however, he was still contributing offensively. You often hear of the water carrier doing the dirty work before giving the ball to players capable of making things happen; Coutinho was a water carrier-playmaker hybrid at times during that season. A new breed of Brazilian, he’s just as creative and dynamic without the ball as he is with it.

      He couldn’t sustain that form and as Liverpool struggled to cope with life after Luis Suárez, Coutinho blew hot and cold. The burden of expectation placed on the youngster’s shoulders saw some disappointed with what they witnessed, echoing his time in Milan. He no longer had Suárez or Sturridge to create for; instead he was supposed to be the creator and the finisher. A magician needs an assistant, otherwise the illusion is lost.

      Liverpool recognised this and last summer they signed Roberto Firmino, a player to share the burden with. Coutinho is no longer the sole player Liverpool look to for a moment of inspiration. Firmino’s presence has allowed Coutinho a little more freedom to express himself. It’s paying dividends for the Reds under new manager JĂŒrgen Klopp. The two Brazilians have played a big part in Liverpool’s positive start under the German.

      While his club career is back on that upward trajectory, Brazil boss Dunga is bizarrely favouring Orlando City’s 33-year-old Kaká over the Liverpool star for the Seleção. Dunga has a peculiar way of picking players for the national side, despite his assurances that form is enough. “If a guy comes in and plays well, he will remain in the squad. They have to seize their opportunities.”

      This is more of a club-style policy – it’s your jersey to lose type mentality – not one you often associate with international football. National sides often pick the form players, and before the last international break Coutinho had scored three goals in two games, two of which came in Liverpool’s emphatic 3-1 victory against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge. It must be difficult to accept for the Rio native.

      Hyped as the next Brazilian star alongside Neymar he missed out on a call up to the squad in his home World Cup. Shunned by Dunga for now, surely it’s only a matter of time before he’s given the opportunity to rekindle his friendship with Neymar on the pitch. Perhaps the incessant criticism Dunga receives for his team selections within Brazil is partly aimed at his continual overlooking of one of the Premier League’s best playmakers.

      It’s this kind of form, though, that could be bittersweet for the Reds. Liverpool want their players performing at optimal levels but as things stand Coutinho’s level is perhaps a notch or two above everyone else’s at Anfield. If the club can’t match his aspirations then he has every right to whisper ‘come and get me’ pleas to the biggest sides in Europe.

      If he’s performing at high levels on a regular basis he could be the next player after Luis SuĂĄrez and Raheem Sterling to earn a big-money move away from Anfield, and it’s not like he’d be short of suitors. He’s the apparent heir to the AndrĂ©s Iniesta mantle, and Barcelona stars past and present aren’t shy in letting him know.

      Neymar has been vocal in his support: “I think there are many players with great qualities that could be playing for Barcelona. He is one of them. He is a great player and his style suits Barcelona.”

      Coutinho’s idol Ronaldinho has also expressed his opinion on the subject: “I can’t speak for him and I can’t speak for Barcelona – but I know what Barcelona look for in a player and he has all those qualities.”

      It’s easy after one big move as a youngster to settle. The passion and drive that got them to Europe burns out when they eventually arrive and their talent goes to waste. Coutinho, to his eternal credit, isn’t like this though. He’s still the youngster who played futsal on the concrete pitch not far from his house. He’s still humble; during interviews when he’s complimented he always makes a point of saying he can improve. He takes to social media to reply to individual messages and thank fans for their support. Liverpool supporters love him, and he reciprocates when he can. He’s immersed himself into the Scouse culture, even adding ‘lad’ to the end of his tweets.

      It’s easy to forget he’s only 23 and is still learning his trade. The next few seasons are pivotal in his development as we finally see what type of player he will become – a number 8 or a number 10. Can his goals become more frequent or will he forever be a scorer of great goals but not a great goalscorer? Either way, the next two years are pivotal in the career of Philippe Coutinho.

      A regular Seleção birth and leading Liverpool to Premier League glory will be his aims: how well he plays will ultimately be the determining factor in both.

      By Sam McGuire. Follow @SamMcGuire90

      http://thesefootballtimes.co/2015/11/29/in-celebration-of-philippe-coutinho/
      srslfc
      • Forum Legend - Shankly
      • ******

      • 32,111 posts | 4876 
      Re: Writing about Liverpool Football Club
      Reply #21: Nov 29, 2015 11:16:27 pm
      PHILIPPE COUTINHO: THE MAN WHO ESCAPED PURGATORY
      MODERN FOOTBALL HAS CREATED A PURGATORY. A place where players are heralded as the next big thing – and who often fail to live up to the hype – are placed in. The lines between star and potential star are becoming increasingly blurred, meaning fans and clubs alike are impatient. They demand an instant impact and if you don’t deliver it’s a missed opportunity for the player, not the club. One player on the verge of escaping his personal limbo is Liverpool’s Philippe Coutinho.

      Philippe Coutinho Correia, the third, and youngest, son of José Carlos, was born on June 12, 1992, in Rio de Janiero and raised in the district of Rocha. A collection of small industrial warehouses was his humble childhood home.

      It was in this area that the future Brazil international learnt his craft. The concrete football pitch close by was his canvas and his elder brothers his inspiration; he would go on to express himself in that concrete jungle.

      Futsal was his game of choice and it wasn’t long before Philippe was getting the better of his elder brothers, Cristiano and Leandro. It also wasn’t long before clubs started taking note and he was asked to attend a trial for Vasco da Gama. It’s hard to imagine it now – the Liverpool number 10 often makes himself at home in some of England’s biggest stadiums – but on his first day he wouldn’t leave his father’s side and cried due to extreme shyness.

      Recalling his futsal years, Coutinho said: “I played futsal from the age of six. Then when I was seven I went to Vasco da Gama, I was playing futsal until I was 11 before I moved to the big pitch. This is where I learned my skills. When you play futsal, it is more technical and much quicker. The place where you play is much smaller and the pace quicker so you need to be a highly technical player to succeed. It helps me adapt quicker.”

      The futsal videos of a young Coutinho – ‘Philippinho’ as he was called back then – can be found on YouTube, with the curly haired maestro still using the same tricks when he plays now as he did back then. He’s a contortionist with the ball at his feet and a joy to watch. The twinkle in his eye and the cheeky smile he flashes after scoring is something Liverpool fans have become accustomed to.

      Coming through the youth ranks at Vasco he often crossed paths with another Brazilian starlet, Neymar. At the time the talk was about which of these two talented youngsters would be the best. The were likened to Robinho and Diego, two players that had some years earlier come through the ranks at Santos. Coutinho’s Vasco defeated Neymar’s Santos in the under-17 Copa do Brasil in 2008 and his star was on rapid ascent.

      Unsurprisingly with a profound South American talent, a move to Europe was just around the corner. Many clubs showed an interest but it was Italian side Inter Milan who took the calculated risk and paid Vasco da Gama €4 million for the services of Brazil’s next big thing.

      After just a few training sessions with Inter, manager at the time Rafa Benítez declared Coutinho would be “the club’s future”. Many will be familiar with the Inter-Tottenham Hotspur 4-3 match, it’s forever associated with Gareth Bale announcing himself to the world, but it was Inter Milan’s number 29 who impressed the football purists. The diminutive Brazilian played a part in two of the four Inter goals while playing on the left of a 4-2-3-1. A bright start at Inter soon faded, however; a mixture of injuries and the sacking of Benítez meant Coutinho finished the season out of the team.

      After failing to establish himself in the first half of 2011-12, Inter allowed Coutinho to be loaned to Spanish side Espanyol, who at the time had future Southampton and Spurs manager Mauricio Pochettino at the helm. The loan deal was the revival Coutinho’s stagnating career needed.

      A return of five goals in 16 appearances – and one of the goals of the season against Rayo Vallecano – led to Espanyol wanting to extend the loan but Inter were convinced of his quality once again and welcomed him back with open arms. Diego Milito, Inter’s leading marksman at the time, commented how “[Coutinho’s] time in Spain changed him for the better”. First team football will do that to a player. The first half of the next season he made 19 appearances for the side, just one shy of the total number he made in the entirety of 2010-11.

      In a bizarre twist he was sold to Liverpool in January 2013 for £8 million – many Nerazzurri fans questioning the wisdom of letting their best young talent leave on the cheap. The fee was too tempting, however, for the Inter Milan owners, who had grown tired of waiting to reap their rewards.

      Later, Inter Milan director Piero Ausilio noted his regret at letting Coutinho leave: “He was just 18 when he arrived at the club from Vasco. Then came [Rafa] Benítez and the expectations were very high. Rafa had used him on the flanks in a 4-2-3-1 formation but he was not playing much so we decided to sell him. I would like young players to grow and succeed here; when I see them play for other clubs, it makes me sad.”

      Inter’s loss was Liverpool’s gain. The mercurial mop-headed number 10 made himself at home in the Liverpool line-up, hitting it off instantly with Luis Suárez and Daniel Sturridge. Originally playing on the left of a 4-2-3-1 – like he had at Inter – his partnership with the latter blossomed in the absence of the former and he was instrumental in Liverpool’s emphatic end to the 2012-13 season.

      He was tormenting players and tying defenders in knots like a certain Cristiano Ronaldo was doing in his debut season at United, with the difference being the Liverpool player had an end product from day one. He’s a gifted player that turns heads and has warmed rival fans to his undoubted quality. He made HĂ©ctor BellerĂ­n do an impression of a dog chasing its own tail when Liverpool travelled to the Emirates in August 2015.

      The following season was one of two halves for both club and player: inconsistent in the first half of the season and magical in the second. The nimble playmaker had his position tweaked; he was deployed as a left-sided central midfielder as part of a diamond and he evolved beyond measure – reaching heights many thought he wouldn’t after his stagnation at Inter.

      The Brazilian attacking midfielder was now doing the dirty work in midfield against the likes of Yaya TourĂ© and Fernandinho. Crucially, however, he was still contributing offensively. You often hear of the water carrier doing the dirty work before giving the ball to players capable of making things happen; Coutinho was a water carrier-playmaker hybrid at times during that season. A new breed of Brazilian, he’s just as creative and dynamic without the ball as he is with it.

      He couldn’t sustain that form and as Liverpool struggled to cope with life after Luis Suárez, Coutinho blew hot and cold. The burden of expectation placed on the youngster’s shoulders saw some disappointed with what they witnessed, echoing his time in Milan. He no longer had Suárez or Sturridge to create for; instead he was supposed to be the creator and the finisher. A magician needs an assistant, otherwise the illusion is lost.

      Liverpool recognised this and last summer they signed Roberto Firmino, a player to share the burden with. Coutinho is no longer the sole player Liverpool look to for a moment of inspiration. Firmino’s presence has allowed Coutinho a little more freedom to express himself. It’s paying dividends for the Reds under new manager JĂŒrgen Klopp. The two Brazilians have played a big part in Liverpool’s positive start under the German.

      While his club career is back on that upward trajectory, Brazil boss Dunga is bizarrely favouring Orlando City’s 33-year-old Kaká over the Liverpool star for the Seleção. Dunga has a peculiar way of picking players for the national side, despite his assurances that form is enough. “If a guy comes in and plays well, he will remain in the squad. They have to seize their opportunities.”

      This is more of a club-style policy – it’s your jersey to lose type mentality – not one you often associate with international football. National sides often pick the form players, and before the last international break Coutinho had scored three goals in two games, two of which came in Liverpool’s emphatic 3-1 victory against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge. It must be difficult to accept for the Rio native.

      Hyped as the next Brazilian star alongside Neymar he missed out on a call up to the squad in his home World Cup. Shunned by Dunga for now, surely it’s only a matter of time before he’s given the opportunity to rekindle his friendship with Neymar on the pitch. Perhaps the incessant criticism Dunga receives for his team selections within Brazil is partly aimed at his continual overlooking of one of the Premier League’s best playmakers.

      It’s this kind of form, though, that could be bittersweet for the Reds. Liverpool want their players performing at optimal levels but as things stand Coutinho’s level is perhaps a notch or two above everyone else’s at Anfield. If the club can’t match his aspirations then he has every right to whisper ‘come and get me’ pleas to the biggest sides in Europe.

      If he’s performing at high levels on a regular basis he could be the next player after Luis SuĂĄrez and Raheem Sterling to earn a big-money move away from Anfield, and it’s not like he’d be short of suitors. He’s the apparent heir to the AndrĂ©s Iniesta mantle, and Barcelona stars past and present aren’t shy in letting him know.

      Neymar has been vocal in his support: “I think there are many players with great qualities that could be playing for Barcelona. He is one of them. He is a great player and his style suits Barcelona.”

      Coutinho’s idol Ronaldinho has also expressed his opinion on the subject: “I can’t speak for him and I can’t speak for Barcelona – but I know what Barcelona look for in a player and he has all those qualities.”

      It’s easy after one big move as a youngster to settle. The passion and drive that got them to Europe burns out when they eventually arrive and their talent goes to waste. Coutinho, to his eternal credit, isn’t like this though. He’s still the youngster who played futsal on the concrete pitch not far from his house. He’s still humble; during interviews when he’s complimented he always makes a point of saying he can improve. He takes to social media to reply to individual messages and thank fans for their support. Liverpool supporters love him, and he reciprocates when he can. He’s immersed himself into the Scouse culture, even adding ‘lad’ to the end of his tweets.

      It’s easy to forget he’s only 23 and is still learning his trade. The next few seasons are pivotal in his development as we finally see what type of player he will become – a number 8 or a number 10. Can his goals become more frequent or will he forever be a scorer of great goals but not a great goalscorer? Either way, the next two years are pivotal in the career of Philippe Coutinho.

      A regular Seleção birth and leading Liverpool to Premier League glory will be his aims: how well he plays will ultimately be the determining factor in both.

      By Sam McGuire. Follow @SamMcGuire90

      http://thesefootballtimes.co/2015/11/29/in-celebration-of-philippe-coutinho/

      Great article and 'these football times' is well worth a follow on Twitter as there is some great writing on there about dome great football subjects.
      racerx34
      • LFC Reds Subscriber
      • ******
      • 33,581 posts | 3826 
      • THE SALT IN THE SOUP
      Re: Writing about Liverpool Football Club
      Reply #22: Nov 30, 2015 10:06:54 am
      "Inter’s loss was Liverpool’s gain. The mercurial mop-headed number 10 made himself at home in the Liverpool line-up, hitting it off instantly with Luis Suárez and Daniel Sturridge. Originally playing on the left of a 4-2-3-1 – like he had at Inter – his partnership with the latter blossomed in the absence of the former and he was instrumental in Liverpool’s emphatic end to the 2012-13 season."

      That parts not entirely accurate though.
      It glosses over the fact that at the end of the 2012-13 season it was Sterling, not Coutinho, that was instrumental in the emphatic end of season run. His partnership with Sturridge blossomed, but as the SAS hit form Coutinho was benched.

      Quick Reply