Well with the finish of the FA Cup final that’s everything done and dusted for another season. I was really hoping that Everton would beat the chavs and bring a bit of silverware back to Merseyside and I was delighted when they scored so early in the game, but ironically that goal may have proved to be their undoing. If the Toffees had managed to keep it score-less than I would have fancied them to nick it late on but once they got the early goal they seemed to start defending too deep and the chavs eventually picked them off. So overall I thought Everton were a little unlucky but it was a great effort by them, particularly in the cup this season.

Anyway that’s the end of what’s been a bitter-sweet week for me. The recession was hit hard at Kopblog HQ and on Friday my job finished up, so I am now as redundant as the mancs open-top bus driver. I’ve known for about 6 months that I would be finishing up but it’s still a real downer when it actually happens and I’ve spent the past week at various farewell piss-ups. But not to worry, unlike Didier Dogface, I’ll get back on my feet again!

On the plus side, work did have this annoying habit of interfering with my blogging so now I’ll have a chance to catch up and now that I have a bit more time I might even give this writing lark a go. That was the bitter part of my week but the oh so sweet part came when I saw the mancs being destroyed by Barcelona in the Champions League final.

There’s no doubt about it, Barca totally outplayed the mancs with some terrific football that was a real treat to watch. Messi in particular was immense on the night and I was delighted to see him cap his performance off with a superb headed goal. His display put some egg on the faces of the morons in the British media who constantly claim Ronaldo is the best player in the world.

Watching them both on the same pitch it was very clear that Messi is a class above Ladyboy. I thought it was very evident during the game that the biggest difference between the two was that Messi plays for his team while Ronaldo plays for himself. But he wasn’t the only manc that got found out on the night.

The game confirmed, once again, how completely over-rated and actually quite limited Fergiescum is as a coach. I thought his tactics in the game were astonishingly inept. The most obvious example was him playing Rooney on the left wing so that he could double up with Evra on Messi, but Messi didn’t play wide left he played in a more central role and ran amok against the mancs for most of the game. It was certainly a clever ploy by the Barca boss but one that could have been countered and yet the mancs boss’s solution was to do nothing.

I don’t want to take anything away from Barca’s superb performance, but the amount of space they were given to play their football was unreal. Obviously I was happy to see this because I wanted Barca to win but from a football point of view I was curious to see how the mancs might adapt or adjust their tactics to gain some control. In the end they didn’t seem to do anything much that I could see and just kept plodding along apparently hoping for the best.

A lot of their players came in for some stick afterwards for underperforming but I thought some of them looked unsure about what they were meant to be doing and were perhaps hoping for some direction to come from the bench but they didn’t seem to get a lot. As I said earlier, I don’t want to take anything away from Barca but in all honesty if we had been playing them I would be very confident that we would have beaten them. Rafa would never have allowed them to have that amount of space to knock the ball about. We would have swarmed all over them in midfield and Gerrard and Torres would have definitely caused their defence all sorts of problems.

I’m not suggesting Fergiescum is a bad manager, in many ways he is very good but he is most definitely not half as good as he’s hyped up to be and this is at its most evident in Europe. Once we went into demise nearly 20 years ago, their biggest obstacle was removed and the mancs have more or less dominated the domestic game since then but they haven’t been quite so successful in Europe.

In the 23 years he’s been in charge of the mancs they’ve been one of the wealthiest clubs in the world and despite his dubious record in the transfer market, he has always had access to unlimited transfer funds. But while they have won a lot of domestic silverware, they have only managed to win the top prize in Europe just twice and in both cases very fortunately. For most teams this wouldn’t be too bad but for a man the British media help to throw knighthoods at and dub the “greatest manager of all time”, it’s hardly eye-catching.

It’s only when you truly look at why he can be so dominant in the domestic game but fail to reach the same levels in Europe that you begin to see the truth behind the hype. In England Fergie has absolutely everything going in his favour both on and off the pitch. First and foremost, with occasional exceptions, he has always been able to outspend his rivals but beyond that he bullys smaller sides, intimidates referees and for good measure he also has manc director David Gill in a lofty position at the FA to ensure they remain on side.

He also enjoys the favours of some of his other manager buddies, as we seen recently with his lap dog Allardyce assisting him in a co-ordinated attack on Rafa, and to cap it all off he also has an adoring British sports media constantly singing the praises of him and his players and seemingly afraid to dare to write a single word of criticism lest they lose their place in his circle of trust. These things have all played a part in the mancs domestic success and if you don’t believe this to be the case then you only have to look at their record in Europe without them.

In Europe, the sides aren’t as easily bullied nor are the referees and Fergie has no “special friends” in positions at UEFA. Outside of Britain the media tends to be a bit more balanced and doesn’t look at him quite so adoringly and he has few if any buddies among the other European managers. So this leaves him with “just” a highly priced team and his ability to manage them and this has led to two fortunate victories in 23 years. Is this the type of record you would expect from a man some people in the media claim to be the “greatest” manager of them all?

As I mentioned earlier, it was our demise as the real force in the English game 20 years ago that allowed Fergie and the mancs to go largely unopposed and dominate for most of the last two decades, but we are no longer in demise. When he arrived at the mancs all those years ago he said it was his goal to knock us from our perch and while he might take the credit, the truth is that due to our own shortcomings we fell from it ourselves. But The Reds are rising once again and Fergiescum can see it happening but can do nothing about it. Now it’s our turn to go knocking people from their perches and for Fergie I suspect the end is nigh!

Anyway, before I go here are a few interesting “facts” about last Wednesday’s game.

Michel Platini has announced that the next time United get to a European cup final, they will play with two balls so each team can have a kick.

Former footballer Paul Scholes has been convicted by an Italian court of assault. The accused’s conviction is as a result of a violent two footed lunge at Barcelona’s second choice holding midfielder Sergio Basquets. Unsurprisingly ‘the consistent inability to tackle’ defence put forward by the accused representative Gary Neville was dismissed by the Italian jury. During the trial the Italian courts turned down extradition applications from Spain, Germany, Portugal, France and Holland. Scholes who is known to be a serial offender for these types of assault tackles is wanted by authorities all over Europe. Interpol said today that they would be launching an investigation to determine how Scholes had evaded police for these assaults for so long.

Keep the Faith

I heard there was a big outbreak of swine flu in London today – apparently there are 50,000 chav fans as sick as a pig! Apologies this blog is mainly on a non-Liverpool related topic but it seems to be what everyone is talking about so I thought I’d join in. I really enjoyed last night’s game, particularly the injury time, and I’d like to start off by saying a big congratulations to Barcelona for winning their way through to the Champions League final.

In my opinion, their away-goal win at the Bridge was not just a victory for themselves but also a victory for football. I was delighted with the result because it spared me from having to watch another CL final between a team I don’t want to see win and a team I don’t think deserves to win. I can’t abide the mancs or anything they stand for and I am normally very happy to cheer on any team playing against them, even our wee neighbours, but no matter what the stakes are I can never bring myself to cheer on the chavs under any circumstances.

I am obviously first and foremost a Liverpool fan but I am also a football fan and in my opinion, Chelsea, its players and supporters are an absolute disgrace to the game and we saw plenty of evidence to support that during the two legs of their semi-final with Barca. I read an article during the week which stated that chelski are not a big club, they are just an average club with a lot of money and I totally agree with that.

It’s really hard to believe that for the first leg of their CL semi against Barca at the Nou Camp, they were allocated 4,800 tickets for their “supporters” and had to return 2,000 of them unsold. I just find that incredible and even if you leave the likes of ourselves or the mancs aside, you could just imagine that if the likes of Everton, Villa, Newcastle, Leeds or just about any other club were involved in such a game, those tickets would be like gold dust.

But the chav fans couldn’t be arsed to turn up, in fact in most of their away games their entire away support could travel together in a mini-bus! They also couldn’t be arsed to really getting behind their team last night and for most of the game they were out-sung by the Barca fans. These pathetic excuse for “supporters” don’t deserve to see any kind of success.

The way their club is run is also quite pathetic. I actually don’t have a big issue with their spending. I think if the funds are there then, unless you’re Arsene Wenger, you’d be crazy not to use them and as I often wish we had more money to spend, I can’t really criticise them for spending theirs. But as far as I can see, for all their spending they have built nothing.

The fact that Hiddink is due to leave them at the end of the season and they will need to appoint someone else means that in the same time that Rafa Benitez has been at Liverpool, they will have had five managers and yet they still don’t seem to have made any real progress in building anything sustainable. There is no meaningful youth system there that I’m aware of, no young players emerging and no real development of the side whatsoever.

Given the money they’ve had at their disposal you would think they had a golden chance to build something significant but there doesn’t seem to be anything there but an aging squad. It seems like they will either have to spend another fortune rebuilding or else they will sink like a stone over the next couple of seasons and in the current economic climate I suspect the latter.

But the perhaps the most shameful thing about the chavs is the conduct of their players. The player-power in their dressing room where they decide to play for certain managers and not for others, the constantly disgusting on the pitch antics of Drogba and their behaviour towards the match officials at the end of last night’s game was nothing short of disgraceful. The chavs were clearly unlucky with some of the decisions but that’s no excuse for the petulant display by their players at the final whistle. Let’s not forget Barca also had a man unfairly sent off and were also unlucky not have had a penalty themselves in the first leg so they would have had just as much reason to feel hard done by if they had lost.

We’ve certainly inflicted quite a number of injury time winners against opponents over the years but we’ve also suffered a few defeats that way and been very hard done by officials ourselves on many occasions. It’s a real sickener when such things happen but you’ve just got to take your medicine and move on. But the chav players behaviour last night and their supporters apparently sending over 100 death threats to the referee is just beyond words. I really hope UEFA throw the book at them and don’t just hit them with some meaningless fine. I think a proper example needs to be made of them and they should be kicked out of next seasons competition.

As for Barca, my respect for them has certainly grown after watching both games. For almost all of the 180 minutes things weren’t really going their way in terms of breaking through the chav defence but their heads never dropped and they kept playing their football. Even when Abidal was unfairly sent-off, they picked themselves up and kept going. As the game entered its final minutes and even into injury-time they never once resorted to just lumping the ball forward, they kept passing the ball and I was delighted to see them get their reward. They really are a proper football team and I hope they go on to lift the trophy in Rome.

Anyway on to Liverpool matters and there’s nothing like a nice stroll on a Sunday afternoon which is exactly what we had against Newcastle last weekend. We never really got out of second gear in the game but we didn’t have to because we were in total control of things from the first minute to the last. The 3-0 score was the least we deserved and the Toon can count themselves lucky the score-line wasn’t far more emphatic.

The crossbar was their best defender and we hit it so many times that once again the ball had to be treated for woodworm at the end of the game. As for Joey Barton’s cowardly tackle on Alonso, that guy is just a total scum-bag but let’s just hope he learns from his parents mistakes and tries using some birth control! Our little competition in the last blog was also very close but congrats to akka for taking the prize and the Amazon vouchers are on the way to him. There will be more competitions coming up in the weeks ahead.

Unfortunately Boro didn’t do us any favours and were complete shite against the mancs but all we can do is keep winning our games and hope for the best. I think we will face a sterner test this weekend away at Wet Spam. They have been playing well since Zola took over and they will be a lot tougher for us to break down but hopefully Torres will be back to help us along.

A win is obviously vital and would put us back on top for at least 24 hours until the mancs play Man City on Sunday. With City you just never know. It’s a local derby so their players should be right up for it and it’s possible they might spring a surprise, as they did in the same fixture last season.

I’ll also be keeping an eye on the game between the gooners and the chavs at the weekend. If the arse win it they will give themselves a chance of creeping into third place and avoiding next seasons CL qualifiers which will give them plenty of incentive when they face the mancs later on.

But all of that will mean nothing if we don’t take three points on Saturday. I have a feeling this will be a close game but I’m predicting a 2-1 win for The Reds and fingers crossed on Sunday!

Keep the Faith

Apologies for the delay between blogs, it’s been a strange week here at Kopblog HQ. In what could be considered an ironic twist of fate, I spent the day of the 20th anniversary of Hillsborough attending a funeral of a relative. My Aunt passed away peacefully in her sleep last weekend and I suppose if you’ve got to go, that’s the way to do it. Anyway with funerals and various other things going on I’ve hardly had time to scratch myself these past few days but I’m back now and I’m pissed off!

I was damn proud of the effort put in by The Reds at the Bridge in midweek but it was frustrating to come so close to achieving our objective only to have it slip away from us. The question ahead of the game was whether we could get through the strong chav defence to score the goals we required, and having Steven Gerrard ruled out with injury appeared to be a major blow to our chances. So I think you’ve got to give full credit to our lads for battling away and scoring four goals, a feat many claimed to be impossible particularly without our captain.

Unfortunately we also managed to concede four which was very disappointing. For me the turning point came from that OG by Reina. I’m not having a go at Pepe because sometimes these things just happen but we were 2-0 up at the time and if we could have kept it at that for a little longer I believe we would have got through. Once that goal went in it filled the chavs with confidence and they became a different team.

There’s no point in me going over the game again at this late stage as it’s already been well covered by others. All I would say is that other than the whistle-happy referee, a guy clearly depriving some poor village of its idiot, who did us few favours and really got on my tits, I’ve got no complaints. I take some consolation from the fact that we played our part in a great game and our performance should give us the heart to go and do our stuff in the rest of our league campaign.

What I really wanted to cover in this blog is this latest attack on Rafa by Fergiescum and his lapdog Allardyce. Given my situation at home this week, I didn’t get the chance to follow much of the media coverage after our game at the Bridge. Strangely though, despite the fact that we got knocked out the little I did see seemed to be generally positive about us, more positive than the mancs received for struggling through against the weakest side in the competition.

Which makes me wonder if this could be part of the reason for this latest joint verbal attack on our boss? But before going into the detail of what’s been said, there are a couple things worth noting about these clowns. The Bung Brothers are connected in more ways than one. There have been serious questions about some of their shady dealings in the transfer market in the past and both have sons who were exposed by the BBC in separate investigations into their extremely dodgy dealings as football agents, where they were fully supported by their fathers. So let us have no lectures on respect for the game from these two pillars of morality!

Anyway, getting back to the matter at hand I find Allardyce’s comments to be particularly cowardly and unwarranted given the fact that he has waited almost a week to make them. He now accuses Rafa of being disrespectful towards him which is a bit rich coming from a guy who publicly called our manager a “whinger” and a “moaner” a couple of days before we played them last week.

Allardyce’s claims in his latest rant he was very upset that Rafa made a disrespectful gesture towards him and his side after Liverpool had scored the second goal in our 4-0 thumping of Blackburn last weekend. Strangely though after the game Allardyce was all smiles and even went so far as to suggest that Liverpool played great and could go on to win the title.

There was certainly no hint of this upset he now claims a week later that he was feeling. The supposed “disrespectful” hand gesture by Rafa can be viewed here, make of it what you will. However I hear he was actually gesturing towards Xabi Alonso because he had taken the free-kick that led to our second goal differently than the way Rafa had instructed him to but as we scored from it the smile and gesture that followed was apparently a light-hearted “it’s ok, pay no attention to me” message to Xabi. We will no doubt hear Rafa’s explanation soon enough but surely that makes a lot more sense than Allardyce’s and Fergiescums interpretation.

The swiftness in which Fergiescum has leapt on this makes it more than a little suspicious that this whole thing has been co-ordinated. This is what the old fart had to say earlier today;

“Benitez said Everton are a small club, which just points to his arrogance,” said Ferguson.

“He had a weakened team and to get that kind of contempt….I don’t think any other Liverpool manager would have done that. It was beyond the pale.”

As you can see from the above he even went so far as to drag up the supposed “small club” reference made by Rafa in relation to Everton about three years ago, strange that he should wait all this time to finally comment about it!

Another interesting point about his comments today is that ahead of the first leg of our CL tie with the chavs a little more than a week ago, Rafa was asked a question about Fungushead which he answered and when Fergiescum heard about it he said, “But the interesting thing as far as Rafa Benítez is concerned is that he’s got a European tie and he’s talking about Alex Ferguson. Fantastic – I didn’t know I was that important.”

So with that in mind, if Rafa chooses to respond to this latest crap I think it would be hilarious if he threw that one back at the old fart and said, “But the interesting thing as far as Alex Ferguson is concerned is that he’s got an FA Cup semi-final and he’s talking about Rafa Benitez. Fantastic – I didn’t know I was that important!”

As far as I’m concerned all of this rubbish stems from the fact that Benitez has clearly gained the upper hand over the manc boss when it comes to these so-called “mind games”. During these verbal exchanges he has been coolness personified to such an extent that even some of the media have swung just a little bit more towards him and away from the moaning old Scottish git.

In fact I think his latest rant may very well blow up in Fergie’s face. I say this because to me this is quite clearly a co-ordinated set-up between Fungushead and his lapdog, and an embarrassingly inept one at that. He is insulting the intelligence of people if he thinks they can’t see through it and in my opinion this is a sure sign that Rafa has got under his skin and he is becoming increasingly desperate. Check this article out for example Click Here

We are running out of games in the league and it could turn out that we fall a little short of overtaking them but when it comes to mind games there’s a new master in town and he needs no help from his friends to mentally torture his rivals. Perhaps in future Fergiescum would do well to remember the old saying, a closed mouth gathers no foot!

Keep the Faith

As I said in the last blog, I wasn’t too surprised to see that the mancs had managed to block Heinze from moving to Anfield. In any other walk of life, if you have a signed letter from your employer giving their consent to you seeking employment elsewhere, then there’s no court in the land that would fail to uphold it. However, if your employer happens to be the mancs and your judges happen to be from the Premier League, then you haven’t got a hope in hell.

Rafa was understandably pissed off with the decision and made some angry comments afterwards which suggested that the mancs have enjoyed some favourable treatment by the Premier League in this and other matters. The only thing I found surprising about his statements was that it had taken him over three years to reach this conclusion and all I could think to say was, welcome to English football mate. (click here)

I think most football supporters of all teams would agree that, both on and off the field, the mancs have always enjoyed favourable treatment by both the league and the manc obsessed British media. Throughout the years there have been countless examples of this. Just some examples that spring to my mind are:

Cantona’s receiving a virtual slap on the wrist by the league for his infamous “karate-kick” assault on a Crystal Palace fan. And by the time the press got through with this one, it was the assaulted fan who was painted as the guilty party and branded a racist. Just one example of many favourable disciplinary punishments handed out to their players over the years.

The mancs pulling out of defending the FA Cup in 2000 with the leagues blessing as their price for taking part in the World Club Championship in South America that year. I don’t remember Liverpool receiving any preferential treatment when they were forced to travel to Tokyo in the middle of the season, to take part in the same competition in 2005.

Back in 1993 when trailing 1-0 at home to Sheffield Wednesday, the referee somehow allowed over 7 additional minutes to be played which enabled the mancs to score twice and win the game that secured them their first Premiership title. Never had so much additional time been played in a league game before or since, and yet no questions were ever asked.

Those are just three examples of many, and that’s without even mentioning the many penalty decisions that always seem to go their way, as Jose Mourinho discovered last season. Favouritism is something the mancs have always enjoyed, but just in case anyone thinks that I am being a little paranoid, consider this. Liverpool are the most successful team in the history of the game. We have won more league titles and more European cups then the mancs or anybody else in English football, and we have also had the most successful manager of all time in Bob Paisley. Yet despite this, check out how many knighthoods have been handed out to manc players and managers as opposed to Liverpool. I rest my case!

The reason I bring all this stuff up is because I read Alex Fungusfaces latest rant about Liverpool earlier today, with some amusement. He told a press conference: ‘We are looking at Liverpool’s whole role in this. We are not letting them off with it.“ I’m sure Rafa is quaking in his boots, but anyway he continued: “That is what we are investigating. We will see how it comes out. David Gill is working on that at the moment. We will get to the bottom of it. They had no chance of winning the case with Heinze. They obviously haven’t studied the Premier League rules.’

Presumably these Premier League rules include a paragraph which states that Liverpool must not piss off the mancs by attempting to buy a player that is readily available to everybody else. It may be the mancs desire not to sell any of their players to a domestic rival, but that doesn’t make it a rule, or does it?

What struck me most about Fergies latest rant is that he now seems to be giving up any attempt to disguise the fact that the mancs and the Premier League are joined at the hip. Afterall isn’t it meant to be the job of the Premier League and not the mancs, to investigate any supposed wrong-doing on Liverpool’s part in this matter?

Or is it just that the mancs are afraid that any impartial investigation into dodgy transfer dealings would surely reveal that it is the mancs themselves who are by far the biggest offenders. In any case I suspect all of this hot air Fungusface is spouting is purely designed to draw peoples attention away from the piss poor start his expensively assembled team have made to the season and I only hope that Spurs can heap more misery on them on Sunday. So get stuffed Fergie, you are nothing but a wart on the arse of humanity!

More importantly, Rafa’s move for Heinze shows he has recognised an area of weakness in the squad and I think its an area that needs to be addressed. If it was just another left back we needed, then I would favour giving young Insua a chance. I was impressed with him in the couple of games he’s had so far and he looks like he’ll develop into a fine player. But, with Paletta going on loan to Boca Juniors for the season, we need some extra cover at centre back and I think he’s going to need to bring somebody in.

On to tomorrow’s game and some people say that it is bad luck for a Black Cat to cross your path, but I think we’ve had more then our fair share of bad luck over this past week and its time for us to turn the tables at the Stadium of Light. These are the kind of games that we simply must win if we are to stay in touch at the top. Too often in the past we have allowed games such as this to become banana skins by failing to take our chances and kill teams off. Sunderland started the season well by beating Spurs but they have conceded 5 goals in their last two games, 2 against Birmingham and 3 against Wigan, so we have got to fancy our chances of finding the net against them.

It looks likely that we will be with Steven Gerrard for the game and without his driving presence in the centre of our midfield, I think we need to be a little more adventurous in the wide areas and in attack (click here) . If it were up to me, I’d like to see Torres and Voronin in attack and the Killer B’s (Benny Onion and Bubble) on the wings.

But Rafa usually favours players that haven’t been involved in the international games, so he will probably go with Pennent on the right and this will probably also mean that Crouch will play in attack. Don’t get me wrong, Crouch would deserve a place in the side for his ability to cause problems for the Sunderland defence, but he also has the extra advantage of being the only player in the side tall enough to have any chance of getting on the end of one of Peanut’s crosses!

Anyway, if we do our stuff tomorrow, my money’s on us continuing our good start to the season with a 3-0 win.

As some of you may know, I’m also the editor of the Vital Networks Liverpool site and as part of the build up to Wednesday’s game I exchanged a few questions and answers with the editor of the, some would say Liverpool obsessed, Vital Chelsea site . There’s plenty to get your teeth into, so I thought you guys might be interested might be interested in both sets of questions and answers below.

Firstly, my answers to his questions.

1. Would you have preferred one of the other two clubs, Manchester United or AC Milan, in the draw?

No. I think we got the toughest draw in the last 16 when we got Barcelona but once we got past that and knew which teams were left in the competition, then given a choice I think we would have chosen to face PSV and the draw kindly gave them to us. Looking at the other three teams in the semi’s, I think its fair to say that the draw has been kind to us again, as if we had been given a choice I think we would have chosen to play Chelsea rather then one of the other two at this stage. I say this because in our four previous Champions League meetings over the last two seasons, you haven’t managed a single goal against us and in our previous 4 meetings in all competitions, we’ve won three. As we all know, the mancs are a jammy shower of bastards and you just never know what your going to get from AC Milan, so although it will be a tough game, I’m happiest about us facing Chelsea.

2. Don’t you just get the feeling that there will come a time soon when you will lose to Chelsea in a cup competition?

Well, of course you did beat us in the Worthington Cup final a couple of seasons back, but given our record against you in cup competitions, I think we’ve every reason to feel confident.

3. Do you agree with Stevie Gerrard’s opinion that a Premiership win would eclipse a Champions League win?

Yes, definately. I don’t think there’s any secret about our desire to win the Premiership and we’ll hopefully put in a decent challenge for it next season but the Champions League is the richest tournament in the game and a wonderful consolation prize.

4. Your opinion on the takeover and what it’ll mean for your club? (Will you be the new Chelsea )

I’m delighted with the takeover. Despite all of our glory years, we were always weak on the business side of things and didn’t even have a corporate box at Anfield until 1992! Although Rafa has brought us great success since his arrival, he has had a relatively limited budget to work with in comparison to the other big teams in the Premiership and beyond. This was mainly due to the clubs debts and the need to fund a new stadium etc. The deal with our new owners means our club debts are pretty much wiped out, the building of our new stadium will finally get underway and Rafa will have a larger transfer budget, so of course I’m happy about it. Our new owners Gillett and Hicks have a very good track record in sports and really seem to have there heads screwed on, in a business sense so it looks like the future is bright. No, we will not be the new Chelsea. We are not very far away at the moment as it is and we don’t need to splash around the obscene amounts of money that you guys do. We just need a couple of real top quality players to add to what we’ve already got and we’ll be fine.

5. Are you pleased to be at home for the second leg?

Yes, I’m very pleased we have the second, and deciding, leg at Anfield. The atmosphere in the stadium will be fantastic, I don’t know if this will have an effect on your players but it certainly has an effect on ours and we will be doing our very best to drive them on, so bring your ear plugs!

6. Where do you see any danger coming from?

Obviously, Drogba is a danger. Now that he’s decided to stay on his feet, he can’t seem to stop scoring at the moment and Joe Cole is also a bit of a bogey player for us. I also hope we have a strong referee who will be able to stand up to some of your more “theatrical” players.

7. The Vital Network – Do you feel the banter between our two sites sometimes verges on the unacceptable?

The banter between our two sites can be a little over the top at times, but I’d rather see it on the messageboards then on the terraces. Despite the intense rivalry between the teams, I’ve never seen any trouble at any of the games. So I’m happy for people to blow off as much steam as they like on the sites, as long as it doesn’t go any further.

And now, his answers to my questions.

1. Yet another semi final between our sides, would you have preferred to meet us in the final?

Difficult! In a way your questions implies it will be Chelsea in the final! We’re not fussed who we face. If you’re going to win the Champions League you have to take on all those sides you’re presented with as opposition. In all honesty, it could be a case of – the better the devil you know – besides, we’re about due for a win in a semi-final against you lot.

2. Unlike many of your other fans, I know you are a lifelong supporter of the Blues, so which former Chelsea players do you think would have got into the current side?

At the risk of being accused of repeating myself; that’s a very difficult question. Football has changed but I’d like to think several of the leading Chelsea players from years gone by would have been professional enough to adapt. In order to simplify things I’ll just pick a couple from each area of the team. In goal, Peter Bonetti would have given Petr Cech a run for his money whilst in defence I’m not sure the tackling talents of the likes of Ron Harris would have been appreciated by modern referees. In the attacking areas I’d hazard a guess that Jimmy Greaves, Kerry Dixon, Peter Osgood, Pat Nevin and Charlie Cooke may well have made an impact. Strangely enough, our current problem area of right back could well be filled by Albert Ferrer who was an unsung hero in the late nineties. However, whilst putting forward the names of these ex-professionals I’d be reluctant to suggest they could oust any of the current team but I wouldn’t complain if they were on the bench ready to be called upon in an emergency. Although the more you think about it the more other names crop up, Ray Wilkins, Eddie McCreadie, the list could go on and on. All in all a pretty unfair question I’d suggest.

3. Does it bother you to have so many divers and cheats in your team?

Oooh! They tell me they studied the Steven Gerrard technique for hours on end!

4. How do you feel about Jose Mourinho’s off the field antics?

The guy is an absolute legend, besides not sure by what you mean about his off the field antics. Has he been up to something we’re not party to? Or do you simply mean his mind games? If it is the latter, I’d just like to say that in the three years he’s been there he’s picked up every trick that Sir Alex Ferguson ever used and has turned the heat up on several of his rivals. There is a reason for this strategy; it takes the heat off of the players. Go on, admit it, the Premiership would be a poorer place for his absence.

5. What’s going on between Jose and Roman, will he still be there next season?

I’d say yes! There is no doubt there has been a fall-out and I hazard a guess we’ll never know the real reason why. However, it’d be madness to get rid of him when he’s done so much in the three years he’s been with us. Unfortunately, Chelsea have a history of shooting themselves in the foot, just look back a few years to the eras of Ruud Gullit and Luca Vialli!

6. Given the recent break down in the clubs contract talks with John Terry, are you disappointed that your captain has turned out to be just another greedy footballer?

Don’t believe all you read! As Terry has said, contract talks always break down. In fact you should probably need to know that one of the clauses he wanted inserted was that if it all went pear-shaped he’d be prepared to have his contract ripped up and his salary re-negotiated. I think football has changed (for the worse), players are now akin to rock star status and the money is being paid accordingly. I’d even suggest that when your American owners get around to improving Liverpool, you’ll have several others on £100k a week. If you want to compete at the top end of the scale you need to pay accordingly. Sadly, it’s resulting in the big four becoming more isolated from the rest of the Premiership. What price a European Super League inside the next decade? As a G14 member, has that not what you’ve been after for years, a chance to feather your own nest?

7. Do you feel your club is treated fairly by the media?

Not particularly! Unfortunately, it’s a British trait to knock those who are on top of the pedestal. If it wasn’t us it would be somebody else. What annoys me is when lazy journalists trot out lame articles that have no truth in them simply to fill a few column inches. Obviously, the tabloids are the worse culprits. However, in recent weeks I’ve been surprised to see those same tabloids grudgingly offering us some praise for our sheer resilience this season.

8. Which three Liverpool players would you prefer not to see in our starting eleven in the semi final?

You are not going to catch me out with that one. We want to face your strongest team, we want to beat your strongest team and not give you the chance to harp on about fielding a weakened side J However, if you were to push me, just take out Gerrard, Alonso and Carragher!

9. If you could only choose one, which would you prefer to win, The Premiership or Champions League?

Seeing as we’ve won the Premiership twice (back-to-back by the way), I’d edge towards the Champions League possibly beating Manchester United a few days after we’ve also beaten them in the FA Cup but saying that it wouldn’t half be sweet to overhaul Manchester United in the Premiership after being so far behind. The look on Fergie’s face would be an absolute picture.

10. How devastated will you be when we beat you, yet again?

Oh! Come on! Devastated! It’s only a game or didn’t a legend in your part of the world sum it up perfectly – “It’s not a matter of life or death, it’s far more important than that.” – I guess life would go on but I can’t see it happening!