SOCCER ENGLISH PREMIER LEAGUE:THE LEADING managers appear before us in a mixture of shame and peevishness as they try to explain why players no longer heed their advice. The reputation of those authority figures is temporarily as dented as that of their defences. Only Alex Ferguson got off comparatively lightly despite the goals Manchester United leaked when Nemanja Vidic and Rio Ferdinand were not on the pitch together.
Football’s TV highlights now resemble a blooper tape. This is chastening for fans of the clubs in question and also for managers who supposed they were in control. Helplessness put Rafael Benitez in a bad mood. On Tuesday evening he seemed to be arguing with Alvaro Arbeloa from the technical area even before the Liverpool right back took his turn to blunder by contributing to one of Andrey Arshavin’s four goals in Arsenal’s draw at Anfield.
The fallibility made the whole side spasmodic and harmed the bid for the Premier League title.
Benitez’s sense of foreboding on the touchline did not arise from a premonition. Fresh memory was enough to make him apprehensive. Liverpool’s defensive equipment had conked out completely when Chelsea eliminated them from the Champions League on a 7-5 aggregate. Absurdly, Benitez’s team have just drawn 4-4 in consecutive matches.
The exciting malaise is widespread. Maybe this virus was incubated at Stamford Bridge. On the weekend before Liverpool came to town, Chelsea barely fought off a recovery by Bolton Wanderers, who rallied from 4-0 down to lose 4-3 amid desperate scenes. That was attributed to a dip in concentration when Guus Hiddink, by taking off Frank Lampard and Didier Drogba, implied the contest was, in essence, finished.
Lapses, however, were to recur. We have seen the elite clubs do not possess the means to cope in defence when the recognised players are missing or out of sorts. For all the promise he may have, Jonny Evans is no longer spoken of as if he were already a perfectly satisfactory alternative to Ferdinand. At Old Trafford and elsewhere, changes are perilous in that section of the side.
Benitez probably preferred Daniel Agger to Martin Skrtel on Tuesday because the Dane’s mobility looked suited to countering a fluid Arsenal. Agger had no such effect and every member of the Liverpool back four floundered at one stage or another.
Arsene Wenger could have proffered reasonable excuses for the brittleness in his defence. William Gallas, Johan Djourou and Gael Clichy are missing. So, too, is regular goalkeeper Manuel Almunia, yet the manager must have supposed that Lukasz Fabianski, with 14 caps for Poland, was ready to stake his claim. Instead, his mistakes led to the Chelsea goals in last Saturday’s FA Cup semi-final loss. At Anfield, Fabianski looked keyed up and made a series of fine stops, but his concentration eventually unravelled.
In Chelsea’s 4-4 draw with Liverpool, Petr Cech’s self-belief came apart. The goalkeeper has rallied since then, but all Hiddink can do is encourage the Czech and pray he is not being undermined by some inner doubt. There is no one else on Chelsea’s books who would pass for a sound alternative to him.
That sort of message is being drummed into us all. Ben Foster, for instance, may have been the embodiment of United’s future when prevailing in the League Cup final shoot-out with Tottenham Hotspur. It was not long, though, before we were reminded that destiny is a shaky concept in football. Foster’s error let Sunderland equalise in an important league game, although United still rallied to win.
Recent events illustrate that significant achievements normally depend on stability. For all the hullabaloo about Steven Gerrard’s groin injury, Liverpool have scored eight goals without him in two games against Chelsea and Arsenal. Yossi Benayoun and Dirk Kuyt, indeed, are thriving now the shadow of the imposing captain is not being cast over them.
Gerrard is not Benitez’s main concern. He and the other managers with hopes of a trophy must be developing a fixation with defenders in all their bruised and bruising glory.
- Guardian Service
