The reaction to Liverpool sacking Kenny Dalglish continues. Fan and HITC Sport writer Mal James has his say.
The Liverpool owners finally reached a decision. The outcome was inevitable, and also one that I agree with. I’m not in any way pleased by events. I’m saddened.
I admire Dalglish as a man. He was a wonderful player. He also stood tall, and was an absolute credit at the time of Hillsborough.
I once had a conversation with a former top referee who had met Dalglish on many occasions and described him as a ‘gentleman’.
When he went back into the Liverpool manager’s post, I feared for him, that if he didn’t manage to do a good job then his reputation would be tarnished.
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His track record in management was not great. Yes, he did well at first in his early days at Liverpool, but that was starting out with a squad that was the best in the country.
He won the title with Blackburn, but that was with pots of money to spend. Since then the fans at Celtic and Newcastle were less than impressed.
He was also taking on a tough ask. The Liverpool owners were being unrealistic if they really expected a top four finish at the end of this season, after years of chronic under-investment.
However, I suspect that the manager’s position would have been safe if the club had shown some signs of moving forward.
Dalglish and his vocal supporters often claimed that the club was doing so, but the facts don’t support this view. Compare this season with the last one of Benitez – considered by many to be his poorest.
P W D L F A Pts Pts Behind 1st
2009-10 38 18 9 11 61 35 63 26
2011-12 38 14 10 14 47 45 52 37
Liverpool finished with 11 fewer points and 14 fewer goals. The gap between them and the top club has widened by a further 11 points. Yes, I know they hit the woodwork 33 times, but that is 33 misses.
As I’ve said in a previous article, if a snooker player hits the jaws of the pocket once or twice, its bad luck. If he does it continuously, he isn’t good enough.
The situation was made worse by the inexplicable decision to keep selecting players who were poor buys. So, Downing got a regular run-out, while Maxi Rodriguez sat on the bench. If Charlie Adam had not been injured, he probably would still have been plodding around the midfield until the end of the season.
After I recently wrote an article critical of Liverpool and the management, one person posted a reply saying that sacking a third manager in such a short time was not the “Liverpool way”. I almost responded that winning just 6 home games from 19 was not the Liverpool way either.
The reality is that Dalglish’s position had become untenable. The owners faced a stark choice. They were clearly not prepared to provide any more funds for Dalglish, given his transfer record so far.
So it was a situation either of keeping him on and going into the next season with the same squad, or bringing in a new manager and providing some funds for transfers. In such a situation, they obviously felt they had little option.
Those fans who will complain loudly should remember that if this had been any other manager than ‘King Kenny’ – Roy Hodgson for instance – they’d have been crying out for him to go, “Liverpool way” or not.
image: © kong niffe
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