It's half-time at Villa Park and Liverpool are 1-0 down courtesy of Stewart Downing. It wouldn't be too hard to imagine what could have been said in the dressing room then. Something along the lines of this wouldn't be too far off...
Come on lads, we can win this! And, when we do, Europe awaits us next season...
Yes, Europe but the Europa League. That great motivating factor for all players who want to achieve something of signficance in their lives. I'm sure the players would be overjoyed with the opportunity to play against footballing luminaries from Azerbaijan, Malta and the Faroe Islands.
So, it came as no surprise that the lacklustre performance continued in the second half and the scoreline stayed the same. Spurs ended up winning their match against Birmingham anyway, condemning Alex McLeish's side to the Championship next season and pipping Liverpool to fifth spot.
The season ended the same way it started - a bit of an anti-climax. But then again, I was never expecting great things this season anyway. It's all about next season then, as is now and that was evident in Dalglish's post-match interview with the BBC.
When asked whether the lack of European competition would be beneficial to Liverpool as it would be one less distraction from the domestic competition, Dalglish just looked at the reporter as if he had asked the world's dumbest question.
After a few moments, to the reporter's relief, Dalglish finally gave him a fitting reply (not Dalglish's exact words but close enough as far as I'm concerned): Liverpool FC belong in Europe. Europe is not a distraction to Liverpool. To some other clubs, Europe might be a bit of a distraction but not to Liverpool.
Brilliant.
And then, when asked whether Liverpool would be spending a wad load of money in the market come the summer, the short reply was that it would take a very special player to replace what Liverpool already have at the moment. Well thought of reply in my opinion as even if Liverpool were going to spend a large portion of the reported £100m budget, it would still give a temporary boost to the current crop of players (especially the Academy graduates) as well as having the effect of dampening any mad inflationary impact and any intent from clubs out there who would like to hold Liverpool to ransom for their player(s).
Can't wait for silly season to start. I've got the feeling this one's going to be a very good one indeed.
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