If Tottenham Hotspur suddenly seem adrift after a rough weekend in Sunderland, what are we to make of Liverpool, who missed out on a golden opportunity in Birmingham to close in on 4th place — and whose captain appears just a bit perplexed…
To say that Steven Gerrard’s reaction to removing Fernando Torres from the game speaks volumes would be grossly inaccurate. That reaction’s message is very short and right to the point: “He’s saving Nino for the Europa League. Why the bloody fuck is Rafa concentrating on the Europa League?”
That’s a mighty good question. When Liverpool reached the quarterfinals of the Europa League, it was guaranteed to make at least £4 million from the media pool money UEFA awards to those eight survivors. (I wrote at length about those payouts here.) That plus the Europa League prize money all but made up for Liverpool missing out on the knockout stage of the Champions League.
That said, Liverpool’s first priority should not be winning the Europa League this season, but returning to the Champions League next season. Tom Hicks and George Gillett heaped a ton of debt on the club with their leveraged buyout, and without that Champions League succor to pay for the interest on those massive loans, Liverpool will be forced to sell Torres (and possibly Gerrard as well) to cover the shortfall.
So why is Rafa Benitez taking his best scorer off the pitch with a half-hour left to play and the score tied at 1-1, when Liverpool desperately points to close the gap on 4th place? Is he really that concerned with winning Europe’s secondary prize?
The only possible explanation for this is that it’s a form of protest. Rafa hates Hicks and Gillett just as much as the Spirit of Shankly does, and perhaps the only way to undermine the Americans’ position is to undermine the club itself. Rafa knows they can’t afford to fire him — unless they pay out of their own pocket, and considering how little of their own cash they spent to buy the club, that’s not likely. So Rafa will railroad the owners by railroading the team, and the fans will back him because 1.) they’ve been backing him since Liverpool won the Champions League in 2005, and 2.) they know as well as anyone that the club’s problems start with horrid ownership that doesn’t have the best interests of the club at heart. Thus, for Liverpool to return to European glory, Hicks and Gillett must sell the club, and lack of Champions League football will force their hand sooner rather than later.
This play has a high probability of blowing up in Rafa’s face, because most supporters would rather not see the baby thrown out with the bathwater. Many will point to substitutions like this and a slew of questionable transfers, and they’ll choose to blame Rafa for Torres being sold next summer, because it didn’t have to be this way.
In the meantime, Torres will be well rested for the 2nd leg of the quarterfinal tie against Benfica, and the Kop will be packed, because it’s still a European night at Anfield, and that still counts for something. Never mind that the Kop will be haunted, no doubt, by the specter of all tomorrow’s European nights falling on Thursdays.
(Video spotted on 101 Great Goals.)
