Hoddy

Funny. As. Fuck.

I go Xavi too.

Yeah, last season's FA Cup vs Newcastle he came on and changed the game.

A ha I knew it! In reality Rashid you are a tall thin white man with a blonde greasy combover!

Friedel, Woodgate (fit and uncoked), Gerrard, Alonso, Henry

Yeah, I do know what you mean, I was only trying to go for the cheap laugh there. It's a problem that players in England have always had, something that's come from our culture of playing. I know when I was younger playing Under 11s and 12s and what not, there was always the mantra of 'give it to the big fast guy and let him run with it'. That's how every team played because the pitches were so big and the players so small. I personally don't reckon that players of a certain age should be allowed to play on full size pitches until they reach, say 13 or 14. If you kept them down to a 5-a-side type of game, they'd learn to appreciate the skill of retaining possession and moving into free space when you've not got the ball. Too much emphasis in this country is put on winning at a younger age, rather than developing football skills.

I see your point, but they were playing Brian McFadden.

"Who's bigger than Liverpool?" Should be on a t-shirt that.

Sorry Rashid I have to disagree. I've heard good things about New Keeper and New Striker, but seriously don't think New Left Back, New Right Winger or New Holding Midfielder would get the job done for us. Maybe it's just me but I don't trust anyone with a double-barrelled name.

Can someone explain to me what these 'revelations' are with Ruddock? I heard something once about coins on the pitch, but never got the full gist of what they were. Apparently it's tainted his time here a lot, but what was it exactly?

I think Hargreaves would be a huge success here. It looks like Rafa's preferred system is the 3 man central midfield he used against Arsenal, with Didi at the back, Alonso in the middle, and Gerrard shooting forward. Hargreaves would be a great replacement for Hamann. Was it Effenberg he was keeping out a few years ago on Bayern's run to the CL final? You don't do that if you're a shit player. But as I type this, on he comes now as a sub for England. Watch him do something stupid like fall on the ball, poo his pants and lift up his shirt to reveal a vest that says 'Hoddy you thick bastard, stop sticking up for me I'm shit. Lennox Lewis and Greg Rusedski would do a better job than I am in my Canadian Holding Midfielder role.'

What about Pistone's flying lunge into Nunez's face?

No, I think it was Portsmouth (possibly Peterborough). We got a replay out of it and tonked them at our place. Actually, it could have been Blackburn. Was it a Mark Atkins own goal?

I have a feeling Bayern could do Chelsea. A strong defensive unit is what Mourinho's lot would not want to play against. They're not half as good when they've got to break teams down, unlike Barca, who came at them and left themselves open at the back.

In disguise as what? A dustbinman?

No, because nobody else could afford him at the time. It's common knowledge we wouldn't bid what Chelsea did, and the same probably went for Man Utd. I don't know much about anything, but I am quite sure he would have preferred to sign for one of these clubs. My gripe isn't that he signed for Chelsea, it's the type of player he seems to have become since Mr Dufflecoat arrived at the club.

Rashid, not sure how much I agree with you on the mercenary thing, but reckon you're cock-on with the way he's changed since joining Chelsea. The way he argued with the ref after Nunez's goal last week is symptomatic of all their players, but there are some you hope are above all that. Duff obviously isn't. Mourinho's halo is definitely slipping.

What a rubbish name. What an awful ref. Our players gave up putting their foot in halfway through the second half cos it was a free-kick whether they touched a player or not. Bennett was totally inept yesterday, and he should be made to sit down with another ref and watch the game again and put a tick/cross on anything he got right/wrong. The result would be embarrassing. Carragher was ace yesterday at the end when Bennett gave a(nother unbelievably innocuous) foul against him. He picked the ball up and basically said, "You have been absolutely shit all the way through the game today." Bennett booked him, but Jamie carried on, then Bennett threatened him with a sending-off, and Carra gave a 'like I give a shit' signal, 'there's about one minute left and you'll probably not even play that you inept bald bastard'. It's so annoying to open the papers today and not hear about this shocking display of refereeing, for it to get clouded out in the Gerrard/Mourinho Cardiff Carnival. Speaking of which, I lost a lot of respect for the Chelsea manager yesterday. It's all well and good to be magnanimous in victory, and look like a complete and utter cool bastard in the process (something which I've been roped into as well), but this last week has proven that when it comes to taking the bad with the good, the winner of Mr Portuguese Designer Stubble 2004 has a lot to learn. I can handle the mind games, I can handle the finger to the lips, I can just about handle the fact that both my mother and girlfriend think he's fit, but I can't stomach hypocrisy. When Deco dived during the week, Jose went apeshit on the sidelines. Why? You pissed off that he still remembered that training session Mr Mourinho? Yesterday, he felt Garcia made a meal of a tackle (an incident I'm sure led to the Carra-baiting), I went fucking wild. How the fuck can he stand there, in my dad's dufflecoat, and remonstrate with our players, when his band of mercenary brothers have spent the game auditioning for film roles of Soldier Who Gets Shot A Lot in Saving Private Ryan 2? Players I once respected like Duff, Cole (to a degree), and Terry have now turned into gamesmanship practitioners of the highest degree. The sad thing was that Bennett fell for it every time - hook, line, and hair-receding sinker. I don't deny the Premiership's not a more interesting and lively place with Mr Mourinho around. I'm just glad we got who we got and they got him.

The West Wing's one of the only decent things on TV full stop. Good idea Jimbo, chicken and West wings at same time. See what I did there? No? Oh shit it's been one of those weekends.

I wasn't disagreeing with facts Stu, I was saying that some of his misplaces passes (the one out of every four) beggared belief. I never said he was hiding either, I just thought he didn't show himself at the top end of the pitch at times when we needed. It wasn't just me either, as all the people I went to the game with thought the same, and opinion on here's split as to his performance. I put it down to the fact that when you're watching the game he's one of the most infuriating players when things don't come off for him. Who knows, maybe if I watch the game again I'll see differently, but I can only report on the way I was thinking at the time.

Sorry Stu, I disagree. Yeah it's good he makes himself available, and yes he was at the heart of some of our best moves, but some of his misplaced passes yesterday were just unbelievable for a professional footballer. I'm talking about 5 yard passes to a guy in front of him. And it seems that everytime this guy loses the ball, it's in the worst possible position for a counter-attack (ref: Fulham at home). I thought Morientes did really well with what he got, but if Garcia was supposed to be the supporting striker, why did he hardly ever run on to anticipate Fernando's flick-ons? Despite the all-round defensive effort from the team, the support for our main forward yesterday was abysmal, and as main support striker, Garcia must take an awful lot of the blame for that.

The Kewell stick is out of order. The first thing people mention when talking about him are his massive wages, but as certain people have said before (when talking about Diao being in the team for instance), you can't really blame him for that can you? And it's obvious from looking at the guy this year that his confidence is at rock bottom. Yet what's the first thing you hear at Anfield when he makes a mistake? A shit load of groans. I don't care how much cash you're earning or what bird you're banging, if you're confidence is gone it's gone. He's never given any intent on leaving, never spoken about passing the buck, only talked about his will to improve, and people on here are giving him stick for this?! He's the one player at Liverpool right now that fans talk about as if he owes them something, e.g, "If he keeps this up then that's ok... he just has to keep playing in the same way as the last few games and I'll cut him some slack..." I'm not too sure why, but Kewell's massive undoubted talent leaves him as an easy target for some fans, and it's not fair. He's done a lot of good this season, setting up the first at Olympiakos, scoring one and setting up the penalty vs Crystal Palace, getting clattered vs Arsenal before Mellor scored, setting up Baros vs Newcastle. I'm not a Kewell apologist by any means, but it's easy to forget some times, that in terms of transfer fees, he's not on Heskey-type of money, in fact he cost the club less than Garcia.

By the way though, I watched the game yesterday, and I thought some of Man Utd's fans' chants were funny as. Everton fans did their usual 'handball' chant whenever any Man Utd player touched the ball in the box, so for the next five minutes all the Man Utd fans did whenever Everton had the ball was 'handball', pass to the next player, 'handball', then to the next player, 'handball'. That was really quite hilarious. Also, their chant of 'Argentina, Argentina!' for Heinze is quality an' all. He is one of the few good signings Ferguson's made in the past few seasons. As for the Rooney thing, I think he is one of the most extraordinary English footballers of recent times. He has so much class, so much natural ability and technique (see his second strike vs Boro), and it's astonishing that he's so young. But to say he handled yesterday well? Well that's just baffling. From the get-go he was angling for an argument, as his pre-match banter with some fat goon and some bird proved. He didn't just walk away when his team scored as Robbie Keane and Gary Mac have done in the past, he actually raced over to his teammates to jump on them as if they were old and wrinkly and offering him sex in a special geriatric brothel. He has all this talent and all this ability and that's why I find it so difficult to understand why he's so angry all the time? Yes he's quite possibly one of the ugliest 19-year-olds in Britain right now, but he's also probably one of the best footballers. Yes he gets his kicks from sticking his willy inside out-of-date granny meat, but he can do things on the football pitch that most of us can only dream of. I'm sorry, but he's one person who I could see NEVER maturing. Wayne Rooney will always be one hell of a footballer, but he'll always be one ugly cunt of an angry little man.

Does anybody else hate this flippant attitude from commentators/supporters/players to certain actions from specific 'smaller' clubs? For example, I'm just watching the Burnley-Blackburn game now, and whenever someone from Blackburn goes down there's this attitude of 'Oh yes he's gone down like he's been shot in the face', yet if a Burnley player dives it's like 'Well he's a shit player so he must be telling the truth'. Either that or 'Ha ha, that's a great attempt at sportsmanship. Good on the lad for having the cahones to try that'. It just pisses me off all the slack that's given to these sort of clubs. Remember that tackle on Viera from a Carlisle player (Prokas?) a few years since? Well that tackle was repeated a few weeks ago on Nicky Hunt by some Oldham player who can only dream of ever playing in the Premiership. People say that big footballers get too much attention and celebrity but there's a flipside to this, for if a Premiership player had committed that sort of foul then he would have certainly been banned and the incident would definitely not have been forgotten about in such a rapid fashion. Also, does the hypocrisy of the BBC not piss anybody off? They've picked games (Oldham/Bolton, Everton/Man Utd, Burnley/Blackburn) because they know there's likely to be a shit load of trouble, then apologise to their viewers when said shit starts to hit the fan. They like to call the FA Cup "Great drama from the BBC." Well here's a thought to those in charge of commissioning this country's programmes; why don't you employ some writers who can actually devise great drama on the BBC, then you can stop trying to incite some yourself you great big fucking wankers.

Yeah I agree with this, but how can he possibly have a proper go at any other player with all the bullshit that's going on around him? I don't know much about what goes on in and around a proper high-level football team, but I know what I've experienced in sports and in the workplace, and I just can't imagine that he's in any sort of place or on any sort of standing right now within that squad to take someone to town. I think it's Paul that's been saying that - and I totally agree with this - discounting the loyalty issues or the money issues, or the 'who's got the biggest willy - Xabi or Stevie' polls, the main reason for Gerrard to leave in the summer is that he mustn't have any credibility whatsoever within that squad right now, and his presence as captain is hurting more than it is helping. Liverpool Football Club is in one of its biggest transitions in years, a really critical season in which foreign players are trying to adapt to the British game, where young players are trying to make that vital breakthrough to the first team, and where a new manager and his completely new team of staff are trying to acclimatise to a whole different way of coaching, playing, and handling football. Former bedrocks of the team such as Hyypia, Henchoz and Hamann have gone or are past their sell-by-date, and other players such as Baros, Traore, Finnan, are at a crossroads in their career. This is the last team in which we need a captain who doesn't know where he's going to be next season. I can't imagine he'd have much respect (or influence) off the pitch on the rest of the squad, and for that reason alone - nothing to do with how good he is, whether he's the best we've ever had or whether he's a real fan like the rest of us - we just need to say farewell and start building once more.