Chewie

See... this is the best bit... is it just me or is Kenny speaking like a man who has already been crowned and knows what's happening this summer Chewie

Just watching a profile on bbc2. Of course I/we hate them but he loves that club, has lived thru it's triumphs and tragedies and lived with integrity throughout... We have our stories and icons...they have theirs and none shines brighter than Charlton Chewie

Ok... here's my Carroll effort...based on the resonance of the Fields of Anfield Road I thought a ballad to hit the right note... (to the tune of Danny Boy...as if you need told) O Andy boy King Kenny he came calling To leave the toon your life up on the Tyne. Come be a legend For the Kop is waiting To sing Wor Carroll Liverpool's number 9 With a left boot that is a thing of beauty A head with power, a ponytail so fine And with one voice We name this son of Liverpool His name is Caroll and He is our number 9. leavin it witcha Chewie

We need more games to 1. Allow players to develop through giving the whole squad playing time 2. Build a European psyche and experience with new players 3. Attract players through both European football and by showing them we are a short step away from the CL through competitive finish in PL 4. and this is v important though often overlooked... Matchday revenue! We need games to attract crowds to pay the bills... FSG keep talking bout revenue and we need to produce it under FFP rules for the following season 5. We should always want to finish as high as possible and win every game we enter... Chewie

Like Tactivation or Motovactics... I'm hoping the King is gonna be a Motovatactionary and we'll be sorted Chewie

I remember some moustachioed Welshman with an affinity for milk n baked beans who used to be our first line of defence... wonder if kenny ever knew him  Chewie

I think Lucas is going to be immense for the next four seasons... Two years younger now than Didi when he signed I read and can be even more effective for us.., Kenny really rates JonJo... brings him into almost any discussion about players who have performed well or young players of real promise... With stevie tho it was something else. Older players in the squad knowing they were developing a real world class player. Have not seen that level of aggression or ability in shelveys game but think he could do very well for us ( a la Lucas who has grown into the team)... Chewiw

Ah c'mon... don't stop believin If city lose gianst Blackburn and chelski beat spuds and we beat Newcastle we'll be one point off fourth! If spuds lose and we win 5th is in our hands and we'd want them to beat city... Gollum has the bluenoses playing useless but dogged... If we win our 4 games it'll be very very interesting... What a man the King is eh... to even make you think you can speak this way Chewie

Agreed 100%... so by that reckoning we need a top class left back. Two experienced full backs plus the young guns as cover and starters in less significant games... No need to hold em back but no need to push them forward when if they've enough about them they'll push themselves forward... All of this is how I remember us in our great days...not afraid to spend for quality, not afraid to promote from within, not afraid to give a player tine to appreciate what it means to be a Liverpool player... Happy with all that ... The King is shedding this club of it's fear...heck I don't even care if the scum win the league as from now on the only thing that matters is us... Chewie

Still need to make signings... If we sneak into any euro competition plus carling we'll need em... Let them blood in... Remember Callaghan talking bout how he got a standing ovation on his debut and then he waited a hecknof a long time before he was a regular...if I was Robinson and Flanagan I'd be looking to feature in 8-10 games next year as reall genuine progress. Kelly should be thinking 25-30 as cover/starting. Let's build an empire, not a youth team... Chewie

Rearrange If damned don't you damned if do you Fair play... credit where it's due Chewie

LOL... It's like the book fat dunk never wrote!! The Insider Pre ordered mine and won't mind one bit how one sided it is...by then it'll be May and I can read of an amazing swindle secure in the knowledge that all is well with my beloved Liverpool.. Reckon you can see in that day 1 part the origins of Carra's unrest at Rafa and how the club was behaving in the public eye... lots of dispute in all that but easy to see why as a player you just resent anything involved in running the club when it's all falling apart... Pity he hitched his hopes on hodgson but who we are now is who I believe he wanted us to be last august when making churlish inferences in rafa's direction... Chewie

John - this is what I meant. To me it's a thrownback to Shankly. Remember Emlyn Hughes saying Chanks would barely look at you if you were injured!! IT was kinda the same yesterday when as soon as Kenny knew Carra was out his main concern was that Flanagan wouldn't let it get to him. during the same period he montioned with his fist and grimaced to the players to stay tough... it's like the only thing that really matters is Liverpool... I love that... it's why I ain't bothered what the scum do. Chewie

This is it.. I woke up this morning not caring one jot what Man United do because finally I feel as if supporting Liverpool is finally all about Liverpool again and not about hoping other teams don't win something. Kenny has made this change. All of a sudden its about us, as it always should have been. The other penny that has been dropping for quite some time now is just how sheer bloody minded Fergie has to be to make that United team so succesful. People wonder how he gets them to win playing the way they are... I look at our team sheet from yesterday and realise the difference greatness makes at the helm of the club. The difference this year and for the past 20 years for United has been Fergie. Jose flattered to deceive as an equal but was always a shooting star. Kenny is the real deal and why it is absolutely paramount that he remains at this club. He brings an aura, a presence that can make a depleted Liverpool feel like Champions again. When Stevie got injured he only wanted to talk about the players that are fit. That's how it should always have been. For too long we drifted in the mentality of hinging our fortunes to certain individuals. Is the King aware of the need of having great players. Totally. He has always went out to sign the best. He knows the game is all about the players... but only the ones who can play. Yesterday he saw a young 18 year old standing on the pitch wondering if he had just knocked Carra into the middle of next season. Was he feeling worried, apologetic, was he fearful for what he'd done, would his mind stay focussed on the game... the King saw this, called him over and made sure he knew he'd done the right thing in going for the ball. This is it. This is the one. It is the King who will make the difference. United can have their knight and fair do's to him for what he has made them become, but our King trumps him and it is now up to us to prove it. From now on, it's all about us. The King is back. Liverpool is back. Chewie

Best thing about Lucas now is that it's really only his bad games that stand out.. Chewie (the real one)

Ball retention not been good... One thing that is apparent in these games is that Carroll does not give us an out thru pace...the hope is that we'll build around this by being more imposing and thru better pace elsewhere...but the option to play a quick ball out behind the defender doesn't really look on... Still... If we can groom Kelly / Flanagan / Robinson to play at full back these next few games could be vital to a much bigger strategy Cmon the mighty reds! Chewie

I think its a bit of both actually. The quote from one of the FSG guys (either Werner or the other guy who runs us who's not Henry!) about how this deal would not have been possible for FSM without the acquisition of Liverpool did make me wonder who is using who to leverage what. Is Liverpool at £300mil a cost effective way to buy into global sports to show that FSM are global hitters across baseball, 'soccer' and basketball... and the acquisition of LeBron James has been worth their investment into us? I don't think this is a particularly cynical way of looking at it, nor even if it has a ring oftruth to it do I think it is the whole perspective on things, nor necessarily something to be totally alarmed by. Why did Roman invest in Chelsea? Why are the Arabs at City? These things are always two-way enterprises with the benefit to the club being that success is a necessity to underpin their alterior motives of exposure, moving money through western political systems, opening the doors and corridors of power in Western circles and so on. FSM are a commercial business who have a passion for sports. Most commercial businesses that are successful have a passion for being the best at what they do. I have little doubt that we are a part of their portfolio, but that portfolio starts to stink a little if we are the poor or unsuccesful component in it. Th Red Sox, LeBron, Liverpool - these are global names and if FSM/FSG use each part of the whole to enhance the whole then that means each part gets stronger....you're only as strong as the weakest member of the group. Are we now part of a global commercial enterprise...yes, will that seem a little unnerving at times... probably in the right hands is that likely to see us play an even bigger role on the global sporting stage...it has to... I think we're heading in the right direction given the commerical realities and context of modern day sport... it's not two jumpers for goalposts... but there aren't too many fans forums for hackney marshes... Chewie

totally... what they've said from the beginning is that they want to spend from within revenue streams and what they are good at is raising revenue streams... how do they do that.. in the US piggy back the Liverpool brand on an already publically marketable asset... the publicity in this is effortless and the profile instantly raised through absolutely nothing to do with football in a hugely commercial area of the world where football is way down the pecking order... how else are they gonna do this... won't be surprised if they pick up where Standard Chartered suggested and look for a player of genuine ability from Asia. If they pay over the odds it won't matter. It'll be like Beckham when he signed for Madrid - apparently he covered the costs of most of the other Galacticos combined...added to this is the tv revenue that comes from overseas telesales... which I believe is outstripping the Sky deal at home... The money is Europe though is in being in the collective bargaining agreement known as the Champions League - be in it and milk the cash cow... if they have to look east and west to find the revenues to ge into the cashflow in our own backyard then that's what they'll do... increasing revenue through sky is difficult and through gate receipts even more so. If there is no European football at all next year that is at least 10 games down. With Ayre and these guys in charge I think we can expect to see a very lean and efficient commercial operation giving global exposure to brand liverpool... and whether we like it or not it is that global perception of the great Liverpool that is going to have young players like Neymar say that 'it is everyone's dream to play for Liverpool... rather than last week when he said it was 'everyone's dream to play for Chelsea... to the 19 year olds out there who don't know our history (and who frankly don't care for it)... it is right here and right now that matters. Lebron James, leading figure in one of the world's most recognizable and universally played sports... its raising revenue time (and if we don't like it then we need to look for some sugardaddy to make us a Chelsea or settlefor mediocrity...) Chewie

I reckon what is going on here is a bargaining strategy...remember Rafa saying it was easier to sign players for cheaper if they said they wanted to play for Liverpool... so we get a process in which - last summer a fee is agreed with differing owners, under a different CEO, with a team managed by a different manager... - then we get Aqualani saying he'd love to stay at Juve - then he says... we'll I'd like to stay and a fee has been set but if that fee cannot be met and I have to return to play in England that would be ok - then he says - I'd like to stay at Juve what's going on here is a player who is saying he wants to stay in Italy but also highlighting that the fee may be an issue, cue renegotiation of fee with new owners, new MD with a new manager looking to a new era... we're talking terms here...nothing more, nothing less... I'll be stunned to see him ever play for us or any team in England ever again Chewie

I suppose the key question is this: If the owners, upon reviewing the situation, determine that a new manager is needed to give us the best opportunity to meet their stated goals of winning the premiership and the CL, would he receive the unequivocal support of the fans even if he is not Kenny? Now the issue is different if they bring in a yes-man to do their bidding but not make us successful, or to ensure that we are top 4 without worrying if we are top 1... you know what I mean.... But if, in the pursuit of domestic and european success they appoint another other than Kenny will he get total support or will Kenny's shadow linger large in the background because the supporters don't like the fact that he is not Kenny? I think this is what they wrestled with in January, but if they make the call to bring in a new man because they genuinely believe he gives us the best chance (therefore a better chance than if we stick with Kenny) then he has to be backed... even if he is Mourinho. I struggle to think who they might bring in to do a better job in a way that fits their working model best, which is complete collaboration and teamwork across every facet of the organisation - maganement, structure and so on. But if they do find such a person then he deserves total and utter support with not a hint or suggestion that the fans have taken the hump... In the end, no-one is bigger than the club - player or manager Chewie (hoping with all his wookie heart that Kenny is that man...)

I think this summer is time for comolli to really earn his salt... This is the time when we need to pluck another hyypia type signing out of the bag. Being linked to premiership players who are homegrown at over inflated prices means we don't need a director of football and this whole moneyball stuff is a pile of nonsense. If we spend big it'll be on 2, 3 at the most players. We really need to sign very very shrewdly. As for kenny, think he should stand on his points per game ratio during his tenure. Then factor in what new signings could enhance this by and weigh up the risk of bringing in a replacement. If this is done it'll have to be an absolute storming candidate to replace the king and if said replacement delivers it'll have been the right decision. Big big summer. What we really need are players who can win games...much easier to organise decent defenders to be effective as a unit than to rely on average creative players to deliver. Utter priority is three truly dominant players, one to boss the middle of the park and two to add class to our attacking play. Chewie

Reckon an honest tribute outfit would come up with something like 'Wookie'... Reckon that'd suffice As always Chewie

Whilst in the pre-premiership era I'd simply have acknowledged that signature as a tribute...in these modern times image rights take precedence and infringements of copyright need paid for..;-) Chewie (like cornflakes...the original and the best...)

This. Well in Lucas. What a week for the fella...best 4 seasons of his career are ahead of both him and us. Chewie

You see this too i can agree with. I've never been an advocate of the theory that if we bring in one player another has to leave. Apart from the obvious financial restrictions one thing I felt hampered us was not bringing in another forward cos what would we do with Torres. The point is simply that in every area of the pitch we should be looking to improve and if Lucas is part of that, great. If he moves on cos we seriously improve both in quality and depth in that area of the pitch then I'll say a huge thank you to the lad and wish him all the best. There is a list of players well ahead of Lucas who fall into the category of needing to be moved on... Lucas is deffo not in that category and I too think we will get 4 great consistent years out of him between 24-28... I also really liked that interview. We need more intelligence on the pitch and he seems to have that about him. Top pro who is really starting to shine and the better the opposition the better he plays. Chewie