Redwire

Battle for Anfield casts shadow over quest for Champions League By Jason Burt Tuesday, 22 April 2008 The battle for control of Anfield will not be confined to the pitch tonight as Liverpool face Chelsea in the first leg of the Champions League semi-final. In an extraordinary move, which threatens to overshadow the eagerly anticipated encounter, senior officials from Dubai International Capital – including the chief executive Samir Al-Ansari – will be in the directors' box as the guests of the club's co-owner George Gillett. The American himself will not attend, due to ill health, which may be a strategic decision, but his son and fellow director, Foster Gillett, will host Al-Ansari and Amanda Staveley, who is DIC's chief negotiator, as they head towards buying Liverpool for around £400m. Tom Hicks, who owns the other 50 per cent of Liverpool, and has become a hate-figure among supporters due to his belligerent feud with Gillett, is also expected to be at the match, which may make for an interesting seating arrangement. It would be no surprise, however, if Hicks cried off at the last moment, with his spokesman last night refusing to confirm whether or not he would travel to Merseyside. If he did, so it would confirm that DIC is set to buy the club. DIC, which has hugely ambitious plans for Liverpool and has been trying to acquire the club for two years, is supremely confident that it will finally reach its goal in the next few weeks. It has already agreed a deal with Gillett, who is prepared to accept less than Hicks to make sure the club's future is secure – even though both businessmen will make a healthy return on the £220m they paid 18 months ago. DIC appears sure that Hicks' public attempts to find the finance to acquire the club outright for himself are doomed to failure. DIC expects the Texan to sell to it and believes he is now just posturing. Meetings have continued behind the scenes over the last few weeks, including several with former players and people who have influence at the club, as DIC wants to make sure it has the fans' approval, which the company believes is vital. And the fact that both Al-Ansari, who is a lifelong Liverpool supporter, and Staveley feel emboldened enough to make public appearances at Anfield shows just how confident they are. Still, Hicks remains belligerent as was evidenced in his television interview last week, which followed his attempts to sack the chief executive Rick Parry, who wants to sell to DIC. But Hicks' bold claims that he can veto Gillett's sale of his stake in the club are not thought to be watertight. The Liverpool manager, Rafael Benitez, is refusing to be drawn on the continued developments over the club's future. He believes he was unfairly castigated for his previous interventions and wants to concentrate on attempting to reach what would be Liverpool's third European Cup final under him in just four years, which would be a remarkable achievement. Chelsea will hope to stymie that, even though they have fallen at this stage of the competition, at Anfield, on two previous occasions. Yesterday the Liverpool captain, Steven Gerrard, who has been declared fit despite his neck problems which ruled him out of Saturday's meeting with Fulham, claimed that Chelsea "will be wary of us and what we're capable of". The midfielder added: "They'll have seen the Arsenal game [the second leg of the quarter-final, which Liverpool won 4-2] and be in no doubt of the task ahead. I have a lot of confidence in us. "This team never knows when it's beaten. Some teams wilt and chuck it when the going gets tough. That's not the case with us; we'll battle and scrap and believe in our ability to do whatever it takes – here at Anfield or down there on their patch – to progress in the European Cup. I don't think there's a player, a manager or supporter of any team in Europe who wouldn't say the Champions League is the pinnacle in football. "That's one of the reasons why we are desperate to be there when the destiny of the trophy is decided. We need to be brave, bold and clinical and in the return game down there. If we do that, then we can start thinking about Russia." Gerrard certainly believes that Liverpool have the sign over Chelsea even if, this time, the return leg is at Stamford Bridge. "It's suggested that it gives them a big advantage over us this time around," he said. "There's maybe a little edge for Chelsea in that, but I don't believe that it will have any say. Stamford Bridge is a big stadium and it might give them more confidence bringing us to their backyard, but it's got nothing like the aura about it that Anfield does – and it certainly won't intimidate us." http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/footbal...gue-813372.html

Avram Grant received a timely boost yesterday, before Chelsea’s Champions League semi-final, first leg against Liverpool, when Frank Lampard returned to training after compassionate leave because of his mother’s illness. Michael Ballack and Didier Drogba were also able to take some part after a week off because of hamstring and knee injuries respectively and will travel to the North West this afternoon. However, they may be considered doubtful because they have yet to train with the first-team squad. Lampard’s position will be assessed closer to kick-off tomorrow based on his state of mind and the health of his mother, but Grant, the first-team coach, is desperate for him to play. The final decision may be left with Lampard. The England midfield player’s return to training for the first time since his sudden departure before last Monday’s match against Wigan Athletic is a positive sign and he has indicated a willingness to travel, but, while his mother remains in intensive care, nothing can be taken for granted. Ballack is more confident of being passed fit after missing Thursday’s win away to Everton with a hamstring problem, but the case of Drogba is less convincing because he is still experiencing pain in his knee. Both will need to prove their fitness by training at Anfield this afternoon, with Shaun Wright-Phillips and Nicolas Anelka standing by. Liverpool’s only problem centres on Steven Gerrard, who suffered a neck injury in training last week, but he should recover in time and Rafael BenÍtez was confident enough to joke about his condition yesterday. The Spaniard is expected to make eight changes from Saturday’s 2-0 win away to Fulham, with José Manuel Reina, Jamie Carragher and Javier Mascherano the only players likely to retain their places. “Steven was a little bit better today,” BenÍtez said. “The other day he wanted to play, but he was only able to look to the right, so I told him he could play as a left winger. Only as a left winger. We’ll see if he can turn his head round and look the other way now. “He was heading balls in training. We were doing some patterns of play and he had scored maybe four or five headed goals. I told the other players to look for other teammates rather than him because every cross was for him. Then, after four or five, he felt his neck. I didn’t know it was that serious, though. “We will talk together, with the doctor. The player will say he wants to play, but there’s an easy way of finding out whether he’s fit. I will come up and tap him on the left shoulder and if he turns to face me without any pain, we will know he can play. Hopefully, he will score with another header on Tuesday.” http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/foo...icle3785085.ece

They won't get bans anyway, just fines.

I don't believe that for a second. Lying c*nt.

Liverpool fans fuming over Tom Hicks display of poor timing April 18, 2008 Oliver Kay It was the mugshot that did it. As the long-awaited interview with Tom Hicks drew to a close, he was pictured drinking from a Liverpool mug that looked as if it had come straight out of the box. What he was forgetting, though, was that the bona fide Liverpool supporters are not mugs and that this latest attempt at spin, like so many others, would not wash. Some of those Liverpool supporters may go farther and call Hicks’s interview with Sky Sports News “a disaster”. That was the phrase that he used to describe Rick Parry’s tenure as chief executive at Anfield and, given that all or some of the interview in Dallas was recorded on the nineteenth anniversary of the Hillsborough tragedy, as a result of which 96 Liverpool supporters died, accusations of insensitivity were inevitable. Yes, he had sought to avoid such accusations by delaying transmission until yesterday morning, but using the d-word was a crass error from a man who seems unable to open his mouth without offending those he aims to win over. “There were huge numbers of supporters grieving for loved ones,” Neil Atkinson, of the Spirit of Shankly group, said. “It was a time to be respectful and understand what this football club is all about. But Mr Hicks seems to have no respect for anyone. He didn’t say anything on the day of the service, but straight afterwards he is up and running again. “Tom Hicks has got no respect for football or this club. The man cannot be trusted at all. He said there would be no debt on the club, but that is not what has happened. The situation with Rick Parry is really an irrelevance. He is good for one thing only and that is his vote at board meetings to keep Hicks at bay.” Parry knows that he cannot survive at Anfield if Hicks succeeds in buying out George Gillett Jr, his co-owner. Hicks denounced Parry’s record as chief executive — ridiculing the club’s attempts to exploit their brand worldwide, a failing to which David Moores, the former chairman, reluctantly admitted when he sold the club 14 months ago — but, as with just about everything at Liverpool at present, the root of it is personal. Hicks feels that Parry was guilty of impertinence when he said recently that it was time to “stop washing the club’s dirty linen in public” and from that moment there was no way back — at least not under Hicks’s sole ownership, if such a thing ever materialises. Hicks tried to paint a picture yesterday of a Liverpool that would thrive under his ownership and he is right to suggest that he has a better relationship with Rafael Benítez, the manager, than Parry or, indeed, Gillett can claim. Again the Texan distanced himself from the attempt to line up Jürgen Klinsmann, the former Germany coach, as a replacement for Benítez in November, saying that Gillett was the instigator of their two meetings and, more damagingly, that Parry “had already been talking to Jürgen for three hours alone before George and I got there”. The intention was to expose Parry as an anti-Benítez force and thus an enemy of Liverpool supporters, but even as he hangs others out to dry, Hicks comes no closer to winning the trust of the club’s fans. He has decided that the embarrassing Klinsmann saga serves as a useful stick with which to beat his enemies (Parry and Gillett), but with every mention of the German, he undermines Benítez. He calls it honesty, but if that is truly what it is, he is honest to a fault. And a majority of Liverpool supporters are not convinced that honesty is the motivation. Honesty, though, is in short supply at Anfield at present, with even Benítez succumbing to the spin, counter-spin and agenda-driven, self-serving comments that are the order of the day at a club that was once a byword for stability and unity. The Liverpool supporters, though, see through it all. They are no mugs. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/article3768361.ece

The thick c*nt also said that Chelsea only drawing at Wigan hadn't made any difference in their chase for the title.

That's brilliant.

I would be amazed if he/his PR company didn't have shills on the major LFC forums, phone-ins and emailing sports news programmes etc.

Chelsea have been sh*t again tonight. I hope they are as poor against us next week.

Tom Hicks set to offer Rafael Benitez new deal James Ducker As one prominent former Liverpool player expressed last night the belief that Rafael Benítez would not be at Anfield next season, Tom Hicks, the club's controversial American co-owner, is expected to reiterate his desire to offer the manager a contract extension today as the knives are sharpened in the bitter boardroom battle. Hicks has made repeated attempts to emphasise his support for Benítez after claiming to have resolved his differences with the Liverpool manager in the wake of revelations that he and George Gillett Jr, his fellow owner, held talks with J�rgen Klinsmann last year about the former Germany coach taking charge at Anfield. Having indicated over the weekend that he would extend Benítez's contract, which has two years to run, Hicks is expected to offer further explanations as to why in an interview with Sky Sports this morning, although the sceptics believe that such declarations are little more than an attempt to curry favour from supporters as he seeks to drive Rick Parry, the chief executive, out of the club. Benítez retains the backing of the fans and, by siding with the manager, Hicks believes that he will strengthen his chances of removing Parry, who has resisted the Texan's calls to resign amid support from the majority of the board, including Gillett. Whether Benítez would sign a new deal, if the offer of one is forthcoming, is another matter. Dismayed by the civil war that has engulfed the club and aware that there may be no shortage of suitors at the end of the season, especially if he can guide Liverpool to a second Champions League triumph in four seasons, Benítez may opt to walk away. Gillett would be unlikely to support Hicks's offer of a new contract, given that he was the one who instigated the talks with Klinsmann, and that Dubai International Capital (DIC), the Arab investment consortium that is confident of taking control at the club, may favour the appointment of its own manager. What is certain, however, is that Benítez and Parry cannot continue to work together. The pair have not seen eye to eye for a long time and the revelation over the weekend that the chief executive was present at one of the two meetings with Klinsmann served only to undermine their relationship further. Unless DIC wins control soon, or one of Benítez or Parry step down, it is difficult to see how the crisis can be resolved before the end of May, when the “first refusal” agreement between Hicks and Gillett, which dictates that one must offer the other his 50 per cent share before doing so to a third party and vice versa, comes to an end. With that in mind, Mark Lawrenson, the former Liverpool defender, believes that Benítez may decide that enough is enough. “The problems off the pitch could give him an excuse to leave,” he said. “If they win the Champions League there would be no shortage of takers and he probably thinks, 'Why should I turn up and flog my guts out for this lot when I don't know what is going to happen next week?'” Of more immediate concern is the Barclays Premier League match away to Fulham on Saturday. Benítez invited fierce criticism by playing a weakened team in the corresponding fixture last season, which Fulham won 1-0, a result that helped to seal Sheffield United's relegation. But amid calls from Gary Megson, the Bolton Wanderers manager, for his Liverpool counterpart to “retain the integrity” of the league, Benítez intimated that he would not play a weakened team as he seeks to all but secure fourth place before the first leg of their Champions League semi-final against Chelsea at Anfield on Tuesday. “We will think about Chelsea, but for us to be in the top four is really important and we will have enough energy to play against Chelsea,” Benítez said. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/foo...icle3761226.ece

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Pretty similar to me that, except we came out of the centre pens and went around to the left.

YNWA

Rafael Benitez hopes to claim more ammunition from Europe James Ducker Rafael Benítez is expected to make a decision on his future as Liverpool manager once the club's Champions League campaign and last hope of silverware this season comes to an end. He believes that the situation at Anfield is becoming increasingly unworkable as the civil war that has engulfed the club shows no signs of abating. Despite the bitter ructions in the boardroom, Liverpool have impressed on the pitch, progressing to the semifinals of the Champions League and assuming pole position in the fight for fourth place in the Barclays Premier League, but the manager is deeply concerned that the off-field troubles could extend into the summer and wreak havoc with any pre-season plans. With the “first refusal” agreement between the club's co-owners, Tom Hicks and George Gillett Jr, which stipulates that one must offer the other the chance to purchase his 50 per cent stake before selling to a third party and vice versa, not due to expire until the end of next month, and with Rick Parry, the chief executive, refusing to bow to Hicks's demands that he resign, Benítez sees no immediate end to the crossfire tearing the club apart. While his position is by no means assured even if he does opt to stay on, Benítez is aware that there would be no shortage of potential suitors at the end of the season - Barcelona and Inter Milan are expected to change managers - and that a second Champions League victory in four years would do his prospects no harm. Although Benítez is in a significantly stronger position than before Christmas, when it emerged that the Liverpool owners had met J�rgen Klinsmann about the possibility of the former Germany coach taking over as manager, Dubai International Capital, the Arab investment consortium, may choose to appoint their own man should they win control at Anfield, while Hicks's support for the Spaniard is viewed by some within the club as little more than a smokescreen with which to curry favour among fans. Benítez believes that he has been undermined on one too many occasions as it emerged yesterday that the club had held two meetings with Klinsmann behind his back. The first was in New York and attended by Hicks, Gillett, Parry and other members of the Liverpool board, while the second took place at Hicks's holiday home in California during Thanksgiving weekend in November, when Parry was not present. Although aware that Gillett and Hicks had met Klinsmann, who takes charge of Bayern Munich on July 1, Benítez reacted with disgust on Sunday to the news that Parry had attended one of the meetings, claiming that it further undermined his position and demanding immediate clear-the-air talks with the board. There were suggestions that Benítez exchanged e-mails with Gillett and Hicks on Sunday evening, but while Parry said yesterday that he would be “more than happy to sit down and talk with Rafa about this”, it was unclear last night whether any discussions had been held between the two. Parry and Benítez are expected to attend a memorial service to mark the 19th anniversary of the Hillsborough disaster today. With the Liverpool players and about 3,000 supporters also likely to be in attendance to remember the 96 people killed in the tragedy, respect should be restored for a day at least, although the war of words may resume tomorrow when Sky Sports televises an interview with Hicks. Neither Hicks nor Gillett, who will continue to stand by Parry despite his partner's claims that he will make a “formal request” to his fellow American to terminate the chief executive's contract, are expected to attend the memorial service. Ladbrokes are offering even money on Benítez not being in charge at Anfield at the start of next season, while the bookmakers could not separate the manager and Parry, with odds of 5-6 on who might go first. The irony for Benítez is that he joined Liverpool primarily to get away from the boardroom problems that he encountered at Valencia, but as things stand, a return to Spain may well prove to be the most appealing option for him. Red divisions The divisions in the Anfield boardroom have been laid bare during a tumultuous past week when Liverpool’s name has been dragged through the mud. Here, The Times examines the contrasting relationships between the main players in the soap opera. Tom Hicks and George Gillett Jr, American co-owners Despite declaring when they bought the club in February last year that their main priority was “winning, then passion, respect for tradition, and legacy”, relations between the business partners soon became fractured and now they are not on speaking terms. Gillett admitted last month that their relationship had been “unworkable for some time”, while Hicks has become incensed by Gillett’s attempts to paint him as the villain of the piece. Hicks and Rick Parry, chief executive The full extent of the hostility has become apparent only over the past few days, with Parry claiming that it has been a “nightmare” working under Hicks and the Texan, in turn, branding the chief executive as “arrogant” with an “inability to manage an organisation”. Theirs is the most corrosive relationship. Parry and Rafael BenÍtez, manager BenÍtez has been privately critical of Parry for some time and the manager could barely contain his disgust on Sunday after learning that Parry was present at one of the two meetings with the co-owners and J�rgen Klinsmann, the former Germany coach, last year. It is difficult to see how the pair can continue to work together. Gillett and Parry Gillett offered Parry his full backing last week amid Hicks’s calls for the chief executive’s resignation, but while Parry has the support of Gillett, there is a feeling that theirs is more a marriage of convenience. Gillett and BenÍtez Although Hicks initially took the heat for the Klinsmann episode, BenÍtez has come to hold Gillett responsible for arranging the meetings to discuss the possibility of the German taking over as manager. Hicks and BenÍtez Some at the club believe that Hicks’s repeated pleas of support for BenÍtez are little more than a smokescreen through which the Texan hopes to curry favour, but both are in regular contact. Hicks and Ian Ayre, commercial director Close allies. Hicks want to replace Parry with Ayre, who he claims has “positioned the club to take advantage of its success on the pitch.” http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/foo...icle3746751.ece

The pitch was sh*t before any rugby was played on it. Too much rain over winter combined with bad drainage. They are doing work on the pitch at the moment to improve the drainage which is why the last two ressies' home games have been moved to Wrexham.

Make it sit down?

No we don't, it's a one off game at Anfield on 7 May.

It's got to be. No-one's that stupid.

Can't we arrange for John Kinsella to have a word with Hicks?

Liverpool's season of boardroom turmoil took another astonishing turn on Thursday when co-owner Tom Hicks asked for the resignation of chief executive Rick Parry. It is believed that a letter arrived at Anfield on Thursday - just 48 hours after Liverpool's triumphant passage into the Champions League semi-finals - demanding Parry's departure. Parry is currently in London at a Premier League meeting but he has been made aware of the communication and is expected to refuse to quit by return of post. This shock move from the Dallas-based co-owner is just another twist in the embarrassing saga over control of the club, which reached a peak last month when talks between Hicks and Dubai International Capital broke down. Hicks was in London last week and watched both of Liverpool's matches against Arsenal at the Emirates Stadium. But on Tuesday, Hicks was back in Dallas watching his Texas Rangers' baseball team while co-owner George Gillett was shown on TV world-wide sitting next to Parry in the Liverpool directors' box. They were watching boss Rafael Benitez's team beat Arsenal 4-2 to progress into another semi-final showdown with Chelsea later this month. And this current development does nothing for the stability of the club ahead of Benitez's attempts to reach a third European Cup final in four years. Gillett's son Foster was also in attendance on Tuesday, as was Hicks' son Tom Jnr, both sons also being directors of the club. And it is also believed that Liverpool fans groups have received e-mails telling them that Hicks wants Parry out. However, with the club ownership split 50-50 between the two Americans, Hicks would not have been able to have got sanction for Parry's dismissal, hence the letter received at Anfield today. Hicks was believed to have been enraged by Parry's interview recently on BBC Five Live in which the chief executive pleaded with both co-owners to end the war between them and come to an agreement that would allow the club to move forward. It was Parry who was largely involved in bringing Gillett to the club 18 months ago, with the American bringing in Hicks for financial muscle to get the deal through. At that point DIC believed they were on the brink of buying former chairman David Moores' majority holding, only for the deal to collapse at the last minute when Moores - now life vice-president and still a board member - changed his mind. Since then DIC have patiently worked towards a deal to buy out both Americans. It is believed that Gillett has agreed to sell his stake, but refuses to sell those shares to Hicks. However, Hicks spent time last week in London trying to raise capital to buy Gillett's shares and to re-finance loans on his own sports empire. He will soon be expected to come up with further loans to fund the building of Liverpool's new stadium. The relationship between Gillett and Hicks has spectacularly broken down, with Parry at times finding himself in the middle trying to run the club effectively on a day-to-day basis. Now Hicks' camp clearly believe that Parry is siding with Gillett as the uproar rumbles on, which has prompted the request for his resignation. The Gillett-Hicks feud has prompted DIC to publicly declare they will make no attempt to make a fresh bid for Liverpool until the two "sort out their problems. DIC chief executive Sameer Al Ansari admitted the consortium would "still love to own" Liverpool and will "continue to be interested" in the club. But, in an interview with Arabian Business magazine, to be published this Sunday, he said: "You have two partners who do not see eye to eye. And we decided that we pull out completely. "Let them sort out their problems." He added: "We will continue to be interested and would love to own the club but we are not going to put ourselves in a difficult situation where we make the investment but we have no control over the destiny of the club and we cannot influence the success of the club. "Unfortunately, the terms that have been put on the table do not allow us to do that." http://www.sportinglife.com/football/news/..._Nightlead.html

Have you not been paying attention? Ant has invoked the A&A "only joking" defence. I'm not sure if it applies only to his posts in this thread or extends to his whole "Rafa is a clueless idiot" campaign.

They have got the league game against Man Utd between the two legs which might be a distraction.

I watched Pepe after the goal and he was furious with himself for letting it in. He knew he should have saved it. He got his angles wrong which is very unlike him.

Vla is lovely! Now where's my flessenlikker?