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Gerard Houllier, the man who once lectured in Liverpool and who many perceived at the time to be the 'epitome' of the Liverpool Way. A Man who gave LFC it's honour back, but was part of a period which saw most of it taken back. We as Liverpool Fans are generally faithful, we stand up for our own in the face of adversity and lies. We look to defend when criticised and always stand by our own. A two fingered salute the establishment. Even when shit hit the fan with the likes of Houllier and Roy Evans a large proportion of our fans where faithful to the end, however at what cost? The Liverpool Way is a term branded about a lot by fans, the press and managers alike. Other than being a website and a fanzine. What is the Liverpool way? You ask one fan what it is, and you ask another and you will probably get two totally different responses. Personally, I think whatever the Liverpool Way is, it isn't a tool, it isn't a methodology, not any more, not since Shanks and Paisley, it's nothing more than a loose term to describe ones own feelings towards Liverpool FC. I always believed LFC was different to all other clubs, I suppose you ask a Fulham fan for example and he'll tell you the same thing, but with ourselves I just see this long list of honours both physically and in terms of being an honourable club. There is something special about this club, whether that is the 'Liverpool Way' I have no idea, but when you follow this club the sacrifices that many people have made for this club it all seems to show the importance that the club has with many peoples lives. This season has seen us in one of the worst runs since the 'Darkest days of Houllier'. We play awful football, our team is performing worse than it should be, and all after one of the most successful campaigns since we last won the league. Are we just in the middle of a full cycle, has our best chance to win the league gone for good, and are the similarities with Houllier's last years simply too strong to be 'similarities'? Everyone remembers when it went wrong with Houllier, or at least many people feel as if they know it went wrong. We stood by him for a while, we gave him the benefit of the doubt, after all this was a man who 'Gave us our pride back'. However, the rest is history and he never recovered. I have stated before the similarities between both reigns, but one thing which convinced me this is going the same way is the posting. Not just on this, but on every other Liverpool forum. I see posts defending the manager, which I myself have no problem with but it gets to the point where it is almost mind-numbingly frustrating to read, it isn't really about defending the manager. It goes back to my original points, it's a two fingered salute to the establishment. I am specifically talking about punditry, and Andy Gray. Now look, Andy Gray, he's neither here or there for me, he's a product, he's marmite, he says some things that make sense, and he chats some absolute horseshit. With Andy Gray, the truth usually hurts, but the one thing I notice about him is that he knows the way, but doesn't know how to drive the car. Take for example, the 'Zonal Marking' argument. I myself have no problem with it, it's a proven system and has worked many times for us. However this season, it hasn't don't ask me why, but it just hasn't and we are now into December and it looks as if WE MIGHT actually be back to normal, although thats too early to indicate just yet. I have read many posts criticising Andy Gray but I find myself saying 'Hang on, he may not know the solution, but we do have a problem, why is our questioning aimed at this man but not Benitez' Andy Gray in many peoples eyes is that 'establishment' he's part of that awful, nasty band of bastards that are really nasty to our manager'. But we need to get it into our head IMO that we are currently in the middle of one of our worst runs going, questions are always going to be asked, and they are always going to be asked at the biggest clubs. Now I couldn't go this far without mentioning the owners, and as the cancer as I believe they are, we still need to get back to basics, we are not accountants, Net Spend, wages etc. Football isn't that complicated, you can point to other clubs, but one thing has stood that we are still one of the biggest clubs in the land, with the best players at our disposal, make no mistake we are still the club that many clubs admire and strive to emulate. We finished 2nd last year, it wasn't an over-achievement, we where exactly where we needed to be in terms of a '5 Year Plan'. Don't let finances dictate expectations, we did well last season, and we could have done better. Skip forward to this summer, we lost Alonso however that being said he didn't star in our win v United. Anyway we sold Alonso, replaced him with Aquilani and strengthened our defence. The title winners United lost the best player in the world, replaced him with a winger from Wigan and an injury prone relegated striker in Owen. That is essentially what happened last summer. Now how come we are worse? How come we are now in this position. It isn't the owners, the owners....you know what, fuck it you know the story and the arguments of this season...So I'll skip to the end. When we sacked Houllier we went down the same route as we did when we first got him in. 'The 5 Year Plan' ever since we last won the league, each manager has been given the 5 year plan, the 5 year plan to deliver the league. Each manager nearly coming close to winning it, but always having different, fatal flaws. My question is now, do we go against 'The Liverpool Way'? Do we go against the mythical methods that are supposed to bring us the league, but haven't since 1990? Football is a changed game, especially in this league, you earn nothing but pointless brownie points striving to be different but always falling short. Are we giving Benitez more time because people feel we are duty bound because people believe in these methods, or are we giving him it because we believe he can rectify this situation? Or are we simply going around in an endless cycle, one step foward, two steps back 5 more years and a terrible last two. Have we been in this situation before? Is it about time we took ANOTHER approach, is it about time we tried something different, is it about time we actually put the CLUB first? I admire loyalty, I always have done and always will do, but I find myself falling out of love with the manager, with the team just like I did with Houllier, I find myself looking at the side and going 'Why the fuck aren't we doing better?' I want to be proven wrong, but I feel as If I've been down this muddy, dark road before. Big wins against Everton and United pale into insignificance when compared to losses v Villa and Fiorentina. 5 Years down the line, this isn't good enough 7 Years ago, we gave Houllier more time, and found ourselves worse off. Is it about time, we actually done something different, is it about time 'The Liverpool Way' was used as motivation for the club, rather than the manager? I really don't know where I am going with this, so I just leave you with a simple opinion. We are going back to the days of Houllier, another manager could have done better with what he has, if we don't get rid of Benitez soon it will be too late, we need to make a decision fast before we get too far away that we need to go back to the 5 Year Plan.