Xabi Alonso: Welcome back to Anfield.

[Em City]

19 minutes ago, Jairzinho said:

 

Yes, but we could celebrate his league title no?

 

That would be normal.

 

I, for one, would like to see more Alonso-favourable stats. 

[Jairzinho]

1 minute ago, Em City said:

 

I, for one, would like to see more Alonso-favourable stats. 

 

Nothing would be more exciting than seeing stats about a manager who told us to fuck off. 

[aws]

4 minutes ago, Jairzinho said:

 

Nothing would be more exciting than seeing stats about a manager who told us to fuck off. 

It’s like having photos of your ex on the walls.  

[Code]

I think there is still a chance, if they win the lot and do it unbeaten , what more can you do there actually?

 

It could all be a part of the dance move to not disturb the run in and a possible meeting in the Europa League, now the possibility of us being up against Leverkusen is out of the way. 
 

I like the focus on giving it all, even if they are already Champions. 

[AHA]

15 minutes ago, Code said:

I think there is still a chance, if they win the lot and do it unbeaten , what more can you do there actually?

 

It could all be a part of the dance move to not disturb the run in and a possible meeting in the Europa League, now the possibility of us being up against Leverkusen is out of the way. 
 

I like the focus on giving it all, even if they are already Champions. 

I said the same thing on the other thread. Say you’re staying and all the noise dies down till the season’s over, then decide what to do. The reports saying Edwards is not averse to making a brave appointment might indicate someone else though.

[Arnaud]

22 minutes ago, Code said:

I think there is still a chance, if they win the lot and do it unbeaten , what more can you do there actually?

 

It could all be a part of the dance move to not disturb the run in and a possible meeting in the Europa League, now the possibility of us being up against Leverkusen is out of the way. 
 

I like the focus on giving it all, even if they are already Champions. 

Doing well in CL is a great challenge, isn’t it ?

[Lee909]

It wont be Xabi

He has told them he is staying, he would look really disloyal to leave now. Anyway the Real Madrid job is there next summer, as will ours and Bayerns if the new bosses don't do a good job

[VladimirIlyich]

On 14/04/2024 at 17:57, Jairzinho said:

 

Yes, but we could celebrate his league title no?

 

That would be normal.

That's Everton levels of vicariousness. 

[kemskem]

1 hour ago, Arnaud said:

Doing well in CL is a great challenge, isn’t it ?

One thing he could have said was he wanted to have a crack at the CL with them. Clutching at straws maybe but he could say Liverpool came in with an offer that was too good to turn down. Would Leverkusen fans hold it against him? At least he wouldn’t be going to Bayern.

[Bobby Hundreds]

1 hour ago, Lee909 said:

It wont be Xabi

He has told them he is staying, he would look really disloyal to leave now. Anyway the Real Madrid job is there next summer, as will ours and Bayerns if the new bosses don't do a good job

Yeah he was pretty clear. He's committed to them for at least another year.

[Section_31]

3 hours ago, Code said:

I think there is still a chance, if they win the lot and do it unbeaten , what more can you do there actually?

 

It could all be a part of the dance move to not disturb the run in and a possible meeting in the Europa League, now the possibility of us being up against Leverkusen is out of the way. 
 

I like the focus on giving it all, even if they are already Champions. 

 

Why's that lad wearing a Waffen SS uniform?

[VladimirIlyich]

10 hours ago, Section_31 said:

 

Why's that lad wearing a Waffen SS uniform?

It seems he's on his way to a rap concert afterwards while remaining camouflaged.

[Kevin D]

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/sport/football/article/why-xabi-alonso-is-greatest-coaching-sensation-since-jose-mourinho-lcm05m8rq
 

Istanbul airport, May 26, 2005. The flight back home with the Liverpool squad is bedlam, befitting the bonkers night before. Normally the media are shoved at the back of the plane but overjoyed, hungover players and their partners are sprawled all over the place. Last to board, I cannot find anywhere to sit. 
 

As I walk up and down the aisle, everyone looks the other way. No one wants to have to squeeze up next to a pesky reporter. And then, as we are about to take off, a friendly voice says: “Do you need a seat? You are welcome to join us.” It will not be the last time that I am left concluding that Xabi Alonso is different.

 

Just one tiny moment of courtesy? Yes, but sometimes the little things tell you a lot — and attention to detail is among the many reasons that Alonso is close to pulling off one of the most extraordinary feats in coaching.

 

In his first full season with Bayer Leverkusen he is three games from an unprecedented, invincible Treble of Bundesliga, Europa League and German Cup. All this at “Neverkusen”, a club without a single league title in more than a century and no significant honour in three decades. 
 

It is the most stunning managerial arrival since a chap called José Mourinho won an almost identical Treble with Porto — league, Uefa Cup, Portuguese Cup — in 2002-03. Never a star player, Mourinho went even further the following season (winning the Champions League) yet still had to strain for attention, to be noticed.

 

When Alonso decided it was time to announce his retirement as a player, he chose not to highlight that jaw-dropping comeback in Istanbul to win the Champions League with Liverpool, or the celebrated La Decima with Real Madrid in 2014. He ignored league titles with Bayern Munich. He even passed over the 2010 World Cup with Spain, when one of the finest midfielders of his generation started every game. There was no sponsored photoshoot or carefully managed interview.

 

Instead, Alonso grabbed a pair of boots, slung them over his shoulder and wandered over to a park pitch with his wife and phone. A simple black-and-white photo of a shy man waving was captioned: “Lived it. Loved it. Farewell beautiful game.” Like I said, the man is different.

 

Happily, I learnt that again when I went to Munich to sit down with Alonso (it took two text messages to arrange, no PRs or fuss) shortly before his final match as a player. Carlo Ancelotti had offered to take Alonso under his wing at Bayern, to give him the sort of fast start in coaching enjoyed by many players of his renown.

Instead, Alonso told me that he had a vintage BMW motorbike waiting in a garage. He was looking forward to some road trips, time with family and to recharge. It was not his legs that needed a break but his mind, which revealed a lot about this most cerebral of footballers. 
 

This is a coach who demands his players think deeply about strategy, but he was doing that 20 years ago. “He always told me to relax and use my brain. It didn’t always work,” Jamie Carragher once said of his Liverpool team-mate. Alonso’s brain whirred incessantly after matches, replaying them for days.

 

He never could understand the inefficiency of charging around, and this belief that intelligence is paramount led to his famous remark that “I don’t think tackling is a quality”. True to his word, Leverkusen’s 13 tackles per game is the lowest tally recorded by a team in any of Europe’s top leagues. 
 

An ability to understand movement and positioning, in an intricate game of possession and fast changes of tempo, has inevitably sparked comparisons to Pep Guardiola, one of Alonso’s esteemed former coaches alongside Rafa Benítez, Mourinho and Ancelotti.

 

Over the years ahead we can expect comparisons too with his good friend from childhood in the Basque country, Mikel Arteta. Born less than 20 miles and six months apart, they will be shaping the game for many years. 
 

Alonso’s team also has its own stamp, notably — shades of Istanbul? — in the character to win or save so many games in the closing moments. In stoppage time after the 90th minute, Leverkusen have outscored opponents 16-0.

 

A stunning late recovery against Roma in the Europa League semi-final second leg, including a 97th-minute equaliser, allowed Leverkusen to claim the longest unbeaten streak in Europe in postwar football, surpassing Benfica in 1963-1965. Their unbeaten run now stands at 50 games, a testimony to self-belief.

In hindsight I was perhaps not sticking my neck out when I concluded that interview in 2017 by writing that “Alonso as the successful coach of an intelligent, passing team is not at all hard to imagine”. But it is not just his record but also how he has gone about the job that is so impressive and, yes, different.

 

Steven Gerrard and Frank Lampard leapt into their first managerial jobs before they had completed their coaching badges. Alonso started with Real’s under-14s and then spent three seasons with Real Sociedad’s reserves. 
 

When he took a senior post, it was not a shortcut to the top but a Leverkusen team sitting 17th in the Bundesliga. How easy it would have been to cash in now by jumping to Liverpool or Bayern but Alonso will see out at least another year because this endearingly earnest man thinks this city of 160,000 people is the best place to develop. 
 

It is not only his playing talent that he attributes to his father, a footballer with Sociedad and Barcelona, but his studiousness and patience given Periko demanded that his son always finish his homework before going out to play.

 

There is a seriousness of purpose to Alonso, who looked dismayed when I asked him to pick his best XI of team-mates. Politely he declined to undertake what he regarded as a frothy exercise, just as he has also knocked back many offers to write a memoir. As he explained: “Some part of me is shy as well. I like to preserve some parts for me.”

 

Holding back a little of himself will not be easy now that he has announced his coaching calibre in such spectacular style. After 11 straight German titles for Bayern, Leverkusen sit 15 points clear going into the final game on Saturday, when victory over Augsburg will make it 28 wins, 6 draws and 0 defeats. Atalanta follow in the Europa League final on Wednesday and Kaiserslautern in the German Cup final. A Treble beckons for the great invincibles.

 

How has Alonso done it? Not with superstars. Smart recruitment enabled the club to sell last season’s star, Moussa Diaby, to Aston Villa for £50million and bring in Nathan Tella from Southampton and Granit Xhaka from Arsenal, among others.

 

Above all, this unbeaten campaign is a tribute to the leadership and clarity from Alonso, whose midfield style always seemed a precursor to coaching: “My idea was never about my game individually. It was always about that collective. If I do this, how does it help the team?” 
 

In that sense he has been preparing for this role all his life. Yet knowing that should not lessen in any way the stunning impact of a season like no other, from a man who dares to act and think a little differently.