Reuters Soccer Blog

Kenny makes cute move in turning to Clark

Kenny Dalgish resisted the temptation to surround himself with Liverpool “old boys” on Monday when Steve Clarke was named as first team coach at Anfield.

It was an astute decision by Dalglish to hire his fellow Scot whose background work at Chelsea as assistant to the high-profile Jose Mourinho was a factor in the London club’s back to back titles in 2005 and 2006.

Liverpool fans were probably expecting some familiar faces to re-appear in the fabled Liverpool boot room, and that may still happen as the list of former players offering their views on the way forward is a long one.

It was hardly the return Dalglish would have wanted at Manchester United in the FA Cup on Sunday as his side went down 1-0 to a dubious penalty and had talismanic skipper Steven Gerrard shown a straight red card for a reckless tackle.

However, Dalglish will know that the important work starts on Wednesday when Liverpool travel to Blackpool for a re-arranged Premier League fixture that was snowed off when Roy Hodgson was still in charge.

That match will tell Dalglish much more about the challenge he faces in the next few months.

With Gerrard soon suspended and Jamie Carragher injured, he will want to see some backbone from some of the club’s senior players. Fernando Torres has too often “gone missing” this season and Dalglish will expect the Spaniard to show the same workrate he praised him for against United.

Dalglish needs a quick fix to hint at hope for future

Kenny Dalglish may not be a long-term solution as Liverpool manager but his appointment will give hope to disgruntled fans and provide a fillip to the club’s underperforming players.

The Liverpool hero has been thrust back into the limelight after 10 years out of management and will lead the club out at Old Trafford for an FA Cup clash against Manchester United on Sunday after replacing Roy Hodgson at the helm.

Hodgson’s position at the club had become untenable as results began badly and never picked up with the likes of Wolverhampton Wanderers, Stoke City, Blackburn Rovers and Blackpool all inflicting embarrassing defeats.

The fans had turned from silent sceptics to voicing loud concerns from the terraces while some high-profile players looked poor imitations of the ones who took Liverpool to within a whisker of the Premier League title less than two years ago.

Dalglish, at 59, does not fit the profile of the young and hungry technocrat, the club’s American owners, Fenway Sports Group, were reportedly keen to appoint.

But FSG will hope the stop-gap appointment will lift the club out of their current malaise and maybe persuade the likes of Pepe Reina, Fernando Torres and Steven Gerrard that a brighter future lies around the corner.

Patience not always a virtue in Hodgson’s case

The Liverpool owners’ decision to use this weekend’s break for the FA Cup as a chance to sit back and ponder the club’s future under Roy Hodgson is a rare patient act in the hasty world of soccer but it might not end up doing the manager any favours.

The Anfield club, just four points clear of the Premier League relegation zone, face rivals Manchester United at Old Trafford in the third round of the Cup on Sunday after another week of speculation and supporter unrest surrounding Hodgson’s future.

Even with the ‘magic’ of the FA Cup, a win against league leaders United seems unlikely on current form, and a defeat to their bitter rivals who could field a slightly weakened side, would only rub salt into already very sore wounds on Merseyside.

A defeat to United does not go down well even when Liverpool are fighting for the title or Champions League places, but when they are faltering in mid-table, a loss would add further ammunition to the club’s unhappy fans.

Hodgson’s decision to dodge Friday’s media briefing was met scornfully by some, but it could prove a decent move as the manager does his best to keep any further criticism of him and his players at bay before Sunday’s showdown.

Having appeared to patiently wait for the FA Cup to pass before making any managerial decision, a Liverpool win could be Hodgson’s only hope for salvation.

Hodgson calls for fan support as decisions loom for Henry

When New England Sports Ventures finally bought Liverpool in October new owner John W Henry did not have to wait long to understand the enormity of the challenge he faces to turn around the fortunes of England’s most successful club.

Just days after the deal was clinched and a wave of optimism swept through Anfield, Liverpool’s inadequacies on the pitch were laid bare in a 2-0 defeat at Merseyside rivals Everton.

More than two months later manager Roy Hodgson, recruited by the former regime, has managed no semblance of an improvement on the pitch and his call for the Anfield faithful to show his team their “famous support” is likely to be seen as a backhanded compliment at best. 

So as the transfer window starts to creak open, the so far quiet Henry will find himself in the spotlight with some important decisions to make.

The Boston Red Sox owner was careful not to raise expectations too high when he took charge of the Anfield club, stating that there was much hard work to be done and no quick fixes, but he must be alarmed at quite how far Liverpool have slid.

Manager Roy Hodgson’s verdict after losing 1-0 at home to bottom club Wolves on Wednesday was damning in its honesty. “We probably didn’t deserve to lose,” Hodgson told the BBC with no hint of irony. “Probably 0-0 would have been fair.”

Goalless draws at home to clubs like Wolves are not what fans of Liverpool have come to expect and there are clear indications that the Kop has run out of patience with the experienced Englishman who appears bereft of ideas at present.

Comolli appointment a step into the sabermetrics unknown for Liverpool

The appointment of Damien Comolli as Liverpool’s director of football strategy represents a step into the unknown for the Anfield club, with statistical analysis likely to replace the traditional eye for talent in the transfer market.

Comolli, like the club’s new owner John Henry, is a devotee of sabermetrics, a form of sporting number crunching used to judge the value of players.

The approach, developed in America, replaces the traditional intuition of coaches with complicated algorithms and aims to unearth rough diamonds plying their trade outside of the limelight.

What this means for Roy Hodgson is unclear.

The Liverpool manager insists his fingers have not been loosened from the levers of power, but a club statement clearly spelled out that the Frenchman’s remit covered scouting, player recruitment and player development.

When asked to imagine the possibility of a confrontation with Comolli, Hodgson told reporters: “I can’t imagine it happening, but who knows? Maybe it will and if that day comes, God forbid, I will deal with it. But I’m not going to be spending any time concerning myself with it at the moment.”

Comolli’s appointment does, however, represent a change in direction for a club who have always placed absolute authority in the hands of their managers.

Hodgson fends off Liverpool crisis talk but…

With their new owners perched in the stands and the shackles of their long-running takeover saga finally cast off, the Merseyside Derby was meant to be the dawn of a new era for Liverpool.

Instead the 2-0 defeat served to highlight the depth of the problems engulfing the club and under-pressure boss Roy Hodgson.

To put their current predicament in context, this is their worst start to a campaign since 1953-54, and Liverpool fans will not want reminding they were relegated from the top flight that season.

Hodgson did his best to put to bed talk of a crisis in his post-match interview, but when a club with Liverpool’s history and reputation is edging towards the precipice of relegation, ‘crisis’ is perhaps more appropriate than the Reds boss would want to admit.

On the pitch, nothing seems to be going to plan for Hodgson at the moment.

Rafa Benitez was roundly criticised for finishing seventh last season with the players Hodgson has inherited. Although early in his reign, the current manager is doing markedly worse.

And one player in particular seems to be suffering more than any other under Liverpool’s current cloud.

Mixed reactions for Liverpool fans over possible sale

Liverpool supporters will be glad to be possibly getting rid of their current U.S. owners but probably did not envisage another set of Americans taking over.

The board of have agreed the sale of the club to New England Sports Ventures (NESV), the owners of Major League Baseball’s Boston Red Sox.

However, like everything with Liverpool at the moment, the sale may not be straightforward as the club will first have to resolve a legal dispute with the current owners Tom Hicks and George Gillett who had sought to sack members of the board in a final bid to keep control of the club on Tuesday.

Manager Roy Hodgson must be tearing his hair out with all this coming on top of the team enduring its worst start on the pitch for more than half a century.

He wanted the issue resolved but if the sale does go through, will the new owners keep Hodgson on?

Neutrals will be looking out for any baseball quirks they might try to bring in at Liverpool, like that famous organ music or supersized hotdogs and foam hands.

Being a Liverpool fan is never dull.

Liverpool’s midfield not as much to shout about

In the heady days of Istanbul and Athens when Liverpool fans considered anything less than a trip to the Champions League final a disappointing campaign, the Kop would regularly belt out: “We have the best midfield in the world.”

It was the formidable midfield combination of Xabi Alonso, Steven Gerrard and later Javier Mascherano that spurred the Anfield faithful into song.

The ditty, sung to the tune of “The Entertainer” for those who were wondering, was unsurprisingly absent at St Andrew’s on Sunday when Liverpool clung on for a goalless draw against Birmingham.

The midfield quartet of Lucas Leiva, Christian Poulsen, Milan Jovanovic and Maxi Rodriguez could not by any stretch of the imagination be described as the best in the world and as the Reds toiled in the Midlands sunshine it soon became clear it wasn’t even the best one on the pitch.

Fernando Torres and Steven Gerrard both cut frustrated figures as Lucas and Poulsen struggled to provide them with the ammunition required to pierce the Birmingham backline.

Former manager Rafael Benitez endured sustained criticism from a press-pack seemingly determined to undermine his achievements for playing two defensive midfielders last season following Xabi Alonso’s departure to Real Madrid.

Toothless Liverpool losing touch already

Liverpool’s current plight was laid bare on Monday when they were humbled 3-0 by Manchester City — a result which left Roy Hodgson’s side fourth bottom of the Premier League.

After just two games it would be churlish to suggest Liverpool will spend too long down in the bottom half of the table, but the feeling that the 18-times English champions are in danger of losing touch with the top four was inescapable.

A quick glance at the table shows Chelsea top, followed by Arsenal and Manchester United and then City — bookies would be offering short odds on that quartet still there in May.

Liverpool now have the admirable Hodgson in the hotseat at Anfield but the wily Englishman faces a tough task if his side are to challenge for one of the Champions League places.

Certainly the title looks well beyond them.

While City’s unlimited spending power means players are falling over themselves to go to Eastlands, Liverpool face a struggle to hold on to one of their best players.

Midfield engine Javier Mascherano was left out against City after Hodgson admitted the Argentine’s head had been turned by an offer to take him to Barcelona.

Benitez leaves Liverpool, next stop Inter?

After months of speculation, Liverpool have confirmed that coach Rafael Benitez has left the club.

Disagreements with the owners and a poor season for the Reds have led to the decision to part company by mutual consent. Do you think it was inevitable?

Inter Milan, without a coach after Jose Mourinho joined Real Madrid despite Champions League glory and an unprecedented Italian treble, are looking for a another high-profile boss and Italian speaker Benitez fits the bill.

First target Fabio Capello has committed to England while Barcelona’s Pep Guardiola and Fulham’s Roy Hodgson, both highly-rated by Inter president Massimo Moratti, look tied to their clubs.

Guus Hiddink has only just linked up with Turkey so it leaves Benitez as the clearest candidate for Inter, especially after praise from Moratti.

But what about the Liverpool job? Martin O’Neill? Mark Hughes? You could argue it is not a great time to be taking the Anfield hotseat if there is limited cash to spend.