Victimpool FC - Klopp leaving, grown men crying

[Lost Mango]

I wonder how he sounds without a throat full of Victimpool rooster

It always amazes me that Henry Winter gets paid so much to write about something he clearly doesn't understand.

 

[DubaiSpur]

As one Liverpool fan posting on the Red And White Kop forum observed: “We aren’t walking through the storm now — we are the storm.” The storm has built gradually and shrewdly under Klopp, a lesson to clubs, whatever the vicious views of rival fans.

Well, we know where Henry Winter spends his days, anyway.

 

[MKSpur]

I simply disagree.

You might see some hypocrisy in it, but I think its perfectly valid to make observations about another team. Regardless of whether or not those same observations might apply to ours.

I agree. Football fans are clams.

 

[Raziel]

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/every-supporter-should-celebrate-if-liverpool-triumph-f8m3677js

Football has always been a kick in the tribals. Rival fans lash out at the lauding of Liverpool, just as many fume at headlines celebrating Manchester United’s revival under Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and seethe at the deification of Mauricio “But what’s he won?” Pochettino.

It’s the supporter’s staple of insularity often stained with jealousy, almost amplifying love for their own team by loathing others. It’s being a fan. Opposing supporters fulminate at the lengthy eulogies bestowed on Emirates Marketing Project under the visionary Pep Guardiola, whose team was acclaimed as the greatest in Premier League history a month ago.

The focus has changed, the pendulum swinging more in Liverpool’s favour now. The media, far from fickle, simply reflects form and there is plenty of uplifting work, on and off the field, to reflect and respect now with Liverpool.

The possibility of Liverpool winning the title — and it needs stating again and again that a defiant, dynamic City still stand in their way — causes apoplexy among many. Talk to fans of other clubs and they frequently claim a media love-in with Liverpool. One Chelsea diehard totted up the number of former Liverpool players working as pundits and, exhausted, stopped at 44. Manchester United alumni fill studios, too.

Most of the former United and Liverpool pundits are pretty objective. Press boxes are neutral, and the three or four Liverpool fans by birth among the main 50-odd football writers are, to this observer’s eye, consistently balanced. Yes, they salute Jürgen Klopp and his team, just as they have City under Guardiola, United under Sir Alex Ferguson, Chelsea under José Mourinho and Arsenal, for the most part, under Arsène Wenger. And yet there is this perception of Liverpool being the media darlings. During an instructive debate on social media over the past 36 hours, one supporter retorted, and doubtless spoke for many: “Facts don’t matter when it comes to hating Liverpool.”

Why? What is it about Liverpool that stirs such antipathy? The tasteless “always the victim” chants from United visitors can be consigned to the shameful shadows where they belong when set against the bravery of so many Liverpool campaigners fighting for justice over Hillsborough. (During the run-in, April brings the 30th anniversary of the disaster, which will keep even the thought of a mere trophy, a mere sport in proper perspective).

Opposing fans accuse Kopites of a sense of entitlement, of living in the past, singing “we won it five times” about their European Cup feats, but great clubs do cherish their history. And if Chelsea fans’ banner of “making history, not reliving it” is a dig at Liverpool, they cannot also slam the Kop for revelling in the present. Isn’t this what every fan wants? A proud past and a future full of hope? Liverpool are in a good place then.

Rival fans spluttering about what Kopites will be like if they were to end 29 years without the title should imagine their own reaction if they had waited that long. Desperate for the trophy. Those holding on even longer, the likes of Everton and Spurs, should take heart that persistence may be rewarded. Even if Liverpool fail to outrun Guardiola’s champion thoroughbreds, there is so much to admire.

Liverpool possess many principles that should be valued even more in a changing, more corporate world. The game should be about glory, about trophies, which Klopp’s men chase and the Kop craves. Football should not be about the battle for fourth, the amassing of dividends for shareholders or who has got the biggest, busiest megastore. Liverpool seem to have the balance right between one foot in the community and one foot in the commercial world.

So those who decry the Kop, who believe that Liverpool fans are a “cult” with their banners and anthems should not forget that it was Liverpool supporters, along with Arsenal’s and a few others, who led the fight against Premier League clubs’ avarice on ticket prices.

In February 2016, the Kop called their owners out over the scandalous £77 charge for a seat for 90 minutes in the new stand, staging a walk-out and chorusing “you greedy bastards, enough is enough”. Fenway Sports Group (FSG), in fairness, backed down (although some issues remain). Liverpool’s chief executive, Peter Moore, recently took to social media to address fans’ frustrations about the members’ ticket sales process. There seems an accountability at Anfield not always found among elite English clubs.

Just talk to Arsenal fans. They would love to talk properly to their increasingly distant club. At Liverpool, FSG appointed Tony Barrett, formerly a football writer of The Times, as head of club and supporter liaison, a conduit between the terraces and corridors of power. When Liverpool visited Roma last May, it was Barrett, standing outside the Stadio Olimpico with many fans and too few open gates, contacting Uefa, urging them to react quickly. Uefa rarely respond with the requisite speed but Barrett got them to, preventing a bottleneck. No wonder his unstinting commitment to fans’ welfare earned him an award from the Football Supporters’ Federation. Other clubs are considering following Liverpool’s example, liaising better with supporters. Good.

Liverpool do many things right, keeping club close to community.

They have a manager in Klopp who cares, who used his Christmas message to hail the NHS and the work being carried out at Alder Hey hospital “with absolute world-class staff supporting those brave children and parents fighting some of life’s most important battles. I cannot tell you how high my respect and admiration is for everyone there”.

Most clubs would love Klopp representing them so passionately, engaging with fans, clearly loved by his players. And yet, beyond the bonhomie is a driven, almost ruthless figure, drawing fully on sports science to prepare his team. Liverpool even employ a specialist throw-in coach.

Klopp is about marginal gains as well as inspiring man-management. He is a man who understands his environment, whether dressing room, stand or surrounding streets, and connects with them emotionally. How many other managers do? Mourinho didn’t.

Klopp’s players are committed to their community work, like their peers elsewhere of course. Everton’s are exceptional. Arsenal In The Community has been changing — and saving — lives since 1985. Liverpool players certainly understand their responsibilities. The captain, Jordan Henderson, organised a whip-round at Melwood for Fans Supporting Foodbanks and met up with Liverpool fan Ian Byrne and Evertonian Dave Kelly, two of the driving forces behind this vital initiative. A foodbank van is stationed on club land on Anfield Road on match-day. Moore is a regular contributor and there is a drop-off point for donations in the Anfield shop.

Liverpool have kept their soul, not always easy for a club in the money-obsessed Premier League. Trent Alexander-Arnold hosted a lunch for the lonely and disadvantaged on Christmas Day, Henderson funded an event for underprivileged or disabled children two days before Christmas and handed out presents, while Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain visited a charity in Toxteth. Many players do this, as they should, using football as a force for good, but it is worth noting in the feverish debate about Liverpool that their squad is a collection of good characters as well as good players.

On the pitch, their talent is clear. It is important for the overall lustre of the Premier League that such a thrilling team, who have never won the title in the present format, are in contention. That might add a fistful of dinars to the next overseas broadcast deal. Everybody benefits.

Anybody who loves exciting, fearless football should appreciate the attacking from full back of Alexander-Arnold and Andy Robertson towards the predatory poetry in motion of Mo Salah, Sadio Mané and Roberto Firmino, who can whip up a storm in an instant.

As one Liverpool fan posting on the Red And White Kop forum observed: “We aren’t walking through the storm now — we are the storm.” The storm has built gradually and shrewdly under Klopp, a lesson to clubs, whatever the vicious views of rival fans.

Stan Kroenke, Arsenal’s absentee owner, could certainly look at what his compatriot John W Henry oversees at Liverpool: an outstanding, balanced recruitment structure, investing properly in ability, seeking out bargains such as Robertson at £8 million and also spending £75 million on a centre back of Virgil van Dijk’s commanding nature, rather than Sokratis and Shkodran Mustafi, defensive makeweights who cost Arsenal £53 million between them. So ignore the tribal screams; Liverpool should be seen as a model club in many ways.

So much flimflam in that article ..

- fudging charity work organized by fan groups .. that is fudging reaching to find something likeable about the club (every club does something, the measuring stick is actually Spurs who outspends Pool/Untied despite the obvious disparity in income)
- Well run club? Pool has teetered on debt, saved by forced buyouts and the occasional "once in a lifetime" sale
- Balanced recruitment? wtf? Benitez -> BR -> Klopp, how many thousands of players did they buy?

Here's the reality

- Pool has consistently matched or outspent everyone except City/Chelsea in the last 15 years (United in last 3 has outspent them)
- Yet Spurs and Arsenal have consistently outperformed them (we have exactly the same number of trophies in last 12 years, Scum has more, both us and Scum have been in CL far more often in last 8 years)

Kept their soul? more like kept their victim ass mentality and outrageous sense of entitlement ..

fudge me, what I would give to see another "title slip" .. let them lead all the way to final month then fall to 3rd or 4th ...

 

[P.D.]

Don't forget buying houses by Anfield and leaving them to rot to drive down property prices and then buying up the others at a reduced rate.

 

[DeanoAustin]

So much flimflam in that article ..

- fudging charity work organized by fan groups .. that is fudging reaching to find something likeable about the club (every club does something, the measuring stick is actually Spurs who outspends Pool/Untied despite the obvious disparity in income)
- Well run club? Pool has teetered on debt, saved by forced buyouts and the occasional "once in a lifetime" sale
- Balanced recruitment? wtf? Benitez -> BR -> Klopp, how many thousands of players did they buy?

Here's the reality

- Pool has consistently matched or outspent everyone except City/Chelsea in the last 15 years (United in last 3 has outspent them)
- Yet Spurs and Arsenal have consistently outperformed them (we have exactly the same number of trophies in last 12 years, Scum has more, both us and Scum have been in CL far more often in last 8 years)

Kept their soul? more like kept their victim ass meteorology and outrageous sense of entitlement ..

fudge me, what I would give to see another "title slip" .. let them lead all the way to final month then fall to 3rd or 4th ...

I don't see it especially if they get a result tomorrow but it would be absolutely glorious if they blew it. Them winning the league will be bad enough but if they go unbeaten, I hope that lad in North Korea and Trump start pushing whatever nuclear buttons they have their fingers on.

I've Liverpool mates who take any chance they can to tell me what bottlers and how S.pursy we are. Let alone all the brick they spout about Alli and Kane being divers (don't get me wrong they do dive now and again but Salah and Mane are pretty bad themselves). Got battered with texts last Saturday about our "title challenge". Wouldn't mind but one of them is very much Islamophobic and doesn't see the irony in idolising players like Mane and Salah. Same fudger tells me how much he hates us "Jewish c**ts". Maybe I need new friends

Can't stand Liverpool. It says a lot about my dislike of them that they are a proper football club and I'd rather see the lottery winners win it than them.

 

[mudshark]

Can't stand Liverpool. It says a lot about my dislike of them that they are a proper football club and I'd rather see the lottery winners win it than them.

I'm sure a lot of Spurs (and other) fans would much rather see City take the title over Liverpool, precisely because the latter are a proper club. If the Scousers do win it, while we continue to bob up against our self-imposed glass ceiling—and so soon after Leicester's success too—then we won't be able to tell ourselves it's all meaningless like when a doped club does it, or that it's a one-off, never-to-be-repeated fluke, either. We'll just have to take the full, jealous burn. So (for tomorrow, at least) Come On You Citizens.

Edit: ...and by the way, yes, it does sound as though you could do with some new friends.

 

[DeanoAustin]

I'm sure a lot of Spurs (and other) fans would much rather see City take the title over Liverpool, precisely because the latter are a proper club. If the Scousers do win it, while we continue to bob up against our self-imposed glass ceiling—and so soon after Leicester's success too—then we won't be able to tell ourselves it's all meaningless like when a doped club does it, or that it's a one-off, never-to-be-repeated fluke, either. We'll just have to take the full, jealous burn. So (for tomorrow, at least) Come On You Citizens.

Edit: ...and by the way, yes, it does sound as though you could do with some new friends.

To be honest, that absolutely isn't it for me. If it was a club like Everton, Saudi Sportswashing Machine or Leicester against City, I'd be going for Everton, Saudi Sportswashing Machine or Leicester. Them winning the league wouldn't dim our progress - in fact, it'd make our ambitions more possible.

Liverpool is a proper football club and proper football city. Great tradition and they live and breathe football up there. But I can't stand the f**kers because my mates support them and, in general, Liverpool fans are a bunch of condescending perennial victims living on past glories.

And don't get me started on the tacos on RAWK who write poetry and put pictures together like the one Brendan Rodgers being told from the clouds that he's doing a great job by Shankley. The only redeeming factor is Klopp who I quite like but even he's starting to irritate me with brick like "I nearly cried when Mo gave Bobby the penalty". They're a nauseating bunch of clams.

 

[jts1882]

Kept their soul? more like kept their victim ass meteorology and outrageous sense of entitlement ..

Most football clubs started as local clubs based around schools, churches or work places. Two well-known clubs stand out as being started as commercial ventures by people who owned a stadium. Liverpool was founded to play at Anfield when Everton left because of some disagreement with the stadium owner. They sent someone to Scotland to recruit a team, which is why their first game had a team who were entirely Scottish. Hardly a community club.

Any guesses for the second club?

 

[MKSpur]

To be honest, that absolutely isn't it for me. If it was a club like Everton, Saudi Sportswashing Machine or Leicester against City, I'd be going for Everton, Saudi Sportswashing Machine or Leicester. Them winning the league wouldn't dim our progress - in fact, it'd make our ambitions more possible.

Liverpool is a proper football club and proper football city. Great tradition and they live and breathe football up there. But I can't stand the f**kers because my mates support them and, in general, Liverpool fans are a bunch of condescending perennial victims living on past glories.

And don't get me started on the tacos on RAWK who write poetry and put pictures together like the one Brendan Rodgers being told from the clouds that he's doing a great job by Shankley. The only redeeming factor is Klopp who I quite like but even he's starting to irritate me with brick like "I nearly cried when Mo gave Bobby the penalty". They're a nauseating bunch of clams.

When Leicester won it I think it devalued our sustainable achievement of busting the top 4. Us winning the league with the 6th biggest wage budget with home grown players would have been the fairy story but in a few years team Leicester winning it will seem as far fetched as Villa and Forest winning the European cup.

I’m torn between enjoying City not winning it despite their ridiculous spending and the Sky tossfest over Liverpool combined with their many nauseating entitled fans. I guess I need to just focus on what a brilliant season we are having under the circumstances we find ourselves in and hope we get do it ourselves in my lifetime.

Ugh - Ive just has a thought Liverpool might win the league, city the European cup, Chelsea the Carabao, Goons the Europa and West Ham the FA Cup! So in that universe Liverpool winning the league might not be the end of the world!

 

[Bedfordspurs]

Most football clubs started as local clubs based around schools, churches or work places. Two well-known clubs stand out as being started as commercial ventures by people who owned a stadium. Liverpool was founded to play at Anfield when Everton left because of some disagreement with the stadium owner. They sent someone to Scotland to recruit a team, which is why their first game had a team who were entirely Scottish. Hardly a community club.

Any guesses for the second club?

United?

 

[Robspur12]

Most football clubs started as local clubs based around schools, churches or work places. Two well-known clubs stand out as being started as commercial ventures by people who owned a stadium. Liverpool was founded to play at Anfield when Everton left because of some disagreement with the stadium owner. They sent someone to Scotland to recruit a team, which is why their first game had a team who were entirely Scottish. Hardly a community club.

Any guesses for the second club?

Chelsea?

 

[the dza]

Nobody knows any Emirates Marketing Project fans in real life, so it's much easier to cope with them winning it. At the same time, phuck Emirates Marketing Project.

Let's just hope we steal it instead!

 

[inkpenspur]

Most football clubs started as local clubs based around schools, churches or work places. Two well-known clubs stand out as being started as commercial ventures by people who owned a stadium. Liverpool was founded to play at Anfield when Everton left because of some disagreement with the stadium owner. They sent someone to Scotland to recruit a team, which is why their first game had a team who were entirely Scottish. Hardly a community club.

Any guesses for the second club?

Was it was our nearest and dearest Goon scum?

 

[StephenH]

If we don't win what does matter who does.
I would not really listen or read about whoever.

If any of you live in Liverpool, that'll teach you.

 

[Raziel]

If we don't win what does matter who does.
I would not really listen or read about whoever.

If any of you live in Liverpool, that'll teach you.

Then you plan to read or watch no media for next 12 years?

The "they are the best side in Europe" narrative is already creeping in … I could do without the toss fest ..

 

[StephenH]

Then you plan to read or watch no media for next 12 years?

The "they are the best side in Europe" narrative is already creeping in … I could do without the toss fest ..

Feels like that for the last 40years.
I just switch off, both mentally and electronically and pretend they are talking about tennis or snooker.

 

[jts1882]

United?

United began as a works club, the Newton Heath Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway Football Club. They were resurrected as Man United after almost going bust.

Was it was our nearest and dearest Goon scum?

Another works club, the Royal Arsenal in Woolwich.

Chelsea?

Yes, the owner of Stamford Bridge stadium didn't think athletics brought in insufficient revenue so he went in search of a football club. He tried to get Fulham but they refused so he created his own club.

Unusually for English football clubs, Liverpool and Chelsea were commercial ventures from their beginnings.

 

[bjholmem]

Arsenal turned franchise when they moved to Highbury. They may not have been formed as a pure commercial venture, but in principle they are the same as Liverpool and Chelsea.

 

[Gazza Dazzla]

Then you plan to read or watch no media for next 12 years?

The "they are the best side in Europe" narrative is already creeping in … I could do without the toss fest ..

You’re US based right Raziel? A bloke from our NY office was asking me about the game today, it’s all over the media there apparently, he knows literally nothing about football and has little interest, but he said something along the lines of “massive game tonight I hear, Liverpool are apparently some amazing side?” No mention of City in the press there, all about Pool?