Pepe Reina’s “headbutt” – I use that term loosely – summed up the frustrations of all Liverpool supporters. You could see the frustration eeking from the Spaniard, months, heck years, of frustration were built up and in a moment Reina let it get too much for him.
Who can blame him though really. Six defeats in seven games, another season of mid-table mediocrity and more players being brought in that aren’t up to par. It’s been a case of one step forward, one step back and two steps sideways.
As much as it was daft of Pepe to do what he did, and he’s acknowledged that, you have to feel his frustrations.
What’s daft is that on another day – one where we weren’t losing 2-0 and on such a horrendous run of form – Reina would’ve shook Perch’s hand, considering the Newcastle player was actually going to say sorry for the ‘trip’ which was more him running into Reina than purposefully tripping him. Ironic then that Perch reacted like a complete berk.
So Reina now misses two League games (Villa, h, Blackburn, a) and the FA Cup semi-final with Everton.
This is where the most embarrassing part of the whole situation comes to the fore for me. We have two experienced goalkeepers, not inexperienced youngsters, in the squad – Alexander Doni and Brad Jones. Yet they don’t have a single first-team appearance between them this season.
I find that pretty farcical and, for me, it shows another example of Kenny Dalglish failing to adapt to the modern game.
Neither Doni nor Jones have been loaned out to keep them fresh and neither have been given a run-out in the League or FA Cup against a lower League team – of which there were plenty of opportunities to do so.
Surely, by sticking Doni in for one of the games against Oldham/Brighton/Exeter/Brighton/Stoke/take your pick it would have only stood to have benefitted us, and shown some foresight to the possibility of Reina not being available for a game.
Frustrating times to be a Red.
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