End of the Big Four?

Who would’ve thought that come Christmas, the Top 10 on the Barclay’s English Premier League Table would look like this:

Liverpool have completely fallen out of the Title Race and, from now on, will be struggling to crack back into the Top 4.

Three of the pre-season favourites to break into the Big Four were Villa, Spurs and Man City, and they all have a realistic chance of doing that. Birmingham have done unbelievably well, and not even their own supporters would’ve predicted 8th place at Christmas!

Fulham, again, have made good progress, and they are definitely becoming one of the more consistent teams. Chelsea and Man Utd lead the league, but watch out for Arsenal, I have a feeling that they might sneak into pole position in the next few months.
Personally I would love to see the big 4 get toppled, which would make the league much more exciting as more teams would have a chance of taking the Title.

Babel Frustrated

Ryan Babel has again expressed his dissatisfaction at not getting enough games at Liverpool under manager Rafa Benitez.
And I don’t blame him.
He has more talent than a few of the other regular starters; He is a much better player than Lucas, and he is better suited to the right wing than Dirk Kuyt.
A midfield of Riera, Benayoun, Mascherano, Gerrard, Babel is much better than one with Aurelio, Lucas, Mascherano, Gerrard, Kuyt.


It also doesn’t make sense to pay £11.5 million for a player and then have him warm the bench every week. He says his talks with Benitez get him nowhere which sounds similar to situations with Harry Kewell, Jermaine Pennant and Xabi Alonso, who all eventually got axed.

Another Day, Another Diver

Another Premier League Match, and another incident of “simulation”. Liverpool’s David Ngog was accused of diving after Birmingham City’s Lee Carsley challenged him in the box. To be honest it was a disastrous tackle by Carsley, he didn’t get any of the ball; but replays showed that he didn’t get any of Ngog either.

 Why is diving so prevalent in the English League these days? It wasn’t that long ago when people used to only talk about the “diving problem” in other countries, but now it is just as common in the Premiership.


Something needs to be done to stamp out this unacceptable form of cheating. If the FA can cite players after games for violent tackles, then they should be able to do the same with divers. If a player is found guilty of diving, then they should get a 3 game suspension. If it happens again in that year, they should be banned for the remainder of the season. Along with the ban will come the shame as being branded a ‘Diver’. There definitely needs to be consequences for players who try to turn this sport into a game for wimps.
Then the next issue the FA can tackle is respecting the Ref.

Nothing can be worse than this diver though:

Top 3 Through, Pool Stumble

In the Champions League Man U and Chelsea both staged some late rescue acts to come from behind to earn good draws. Liverpool thought they had ended their losing streak when Ryan Babel fired them to a 1-0 lead in the 83rd minute. It was a great strike which opened the question why he didn’t start the match instead of Veronin.

The team of the week was undoubtedly Arsenal. They breezed past AZ Alkmaar 4 -1. With another two goals Cesc Fabregas once again enhanced his already blossoming reputation.

Liverpool Sinking...

Liverpool’s disastrous run continued with a 3-1 defeat at the hands of Fulham on Saturday. Fulham is not a bad team, and Roy Hodgson is a great manager, but they should not have been able to walk all over a ‘big four’ team.


Benitez again (see Rafa is the Idiot) made “dubious” (to put it mildly) decisions.
- Started with Lucas
- Stuck Benayoun out on the left, and used Veronin instead behind Torres
- Substituted both Benayoun and Torres, Liverpool’s two main players (and the only effective ones on the day)

I would sack Benitez immediately, and just let Sammy Lee take over the Head Coach position. He is a Liverpool legend, and has managed Bolton, so has all the credentials, and he would never be as conservative as Rafa.

The Liverpool board keep waiting for another loss before they consider Benitez’s sacking, but if they wait much longer, Liverpool will be fighting to stay in the Top half of the Premiership.