Topsy-turvy day as Rafa resembles you know Hou

WE’VE just won seven games out of the last nine, so why the long face? Are we such ungrateful curs? It’s like getting to sleep with Cameron Diaz and moaning about the price of condoms.

Welcome to our schizophrenic world.

Unbeatable at home, dreadful away. Every home success, though welcome, feels like being told the hangman’s run out of rope but you know it’s merely a temporary reprieve until the shops open.

I wish I could say the performances were baffling but it’s not like we’re leaving Anfield blinded by the dazzle. We hardly swing from the sublime to the ridiculous do we? The game with PSV was played out as if both teams dreaded the “luck of the draw” that usually follows becoming too gleeful about finishing first.

When Andy Cole broke a European scoring record that had once belonged to the imperious Denis Law, this safety net competition should have been exposed for the farcical charade that it is. You tend to feel like a surly adult watching a magician’s trick with a room full of children — while admiring the dexterity of the subterfuge being played out, you can sense an irrational irritability with the gullibility all around.

When the only thing that’s remotely entertaining is the foul-mouthed abuse emanating from the away end (in perfect English!), you’re closing in on the nadir of futility.

One has to admire the brazen cheek of Jan Kromkamp who claimed he never settled here because of “rotation”. It couldn’t top Josemi, who bizarrely blamed baked beans for his downfall in one interview, but it was mighty close. Rotation from bench to stand and back again tends not to bring the best out of players, I’ll give him that much.

Compared to the huge roar that greeted the great Dietmar Hamann’s return three days later, Jan’s ovation could only be heard by dogs.

Liverpool’s poor away form resembles Rafa’s first season, and just when you get used to the weirdness, along come the injuries. Sarcastic types were heard muttering about rotation and how it kept players fresh for a long, hard season. Moans turned to wails when a third player went off on a stretcher. Still, it was only Pennant. The thought of it being Gerrard curdled the blood.

Gerrard is getting better. There’s no denying it, though I’d dearly love to. It all somehow smacks of a tantrum being rewarded but when two humdrum matches are turned 180 degrees by the same player’s sporadic effervescence it’s churlish to complain.

So far Benitez is trying not to rise to a rabid media’s “told you so” baiting and even snotty remarks about his appearance. For those fans with their guard permanently and prematurely up for any sign of Houllieritis, it wasn’t a particularly good week.

Rafa was talking about the four trophies he’s won while he’s been here. Yes, he really is counting the Community Shield. Triz, knock yourself out! That was unsettling enough, but before the City game there was some preposterous slop about an extra day’s rest after Champions League games.

Which would have given us one day less to prepare for tonight’s game with Portsmouth, surely? When he gave Allardyce the psychological edge in September about Bolton’s physical presence one would have hoped he’d learned a lesson. But talk of tiredness only looked like it made our players lethargic. The first hour against City was incredibly turgid, not helped by City parking a fleet of buses.

Gerrard had been put in the shadow by an energetic performance from Barton, albeit one that lacked the true moment of class that our captain can seemingly provide without effort or forethought.

And our man is better at winning penalties too, or is that just an England thing? It was noticeable Micah Richards is already getting away with two or three snide moments.

The pressure is really on now. A look at the next batch of fixtures will not suck the word “easy” from this wise old cove’s keyboard, but all around assumptions are being made about our away form improving.

On the indisputable evidence that it could hardly get much worse I will cautiously concur and cross all fingers.

My mid-life insularity meant I watched little of The Big Match. I always find watching the other teams merely provides visible proof of how far Liverpool need to climb so it’s just depressing really.

Although I did enjoy the Celtic game and United fans’ baffling, lung-busting mission to remind the world that they’ve won three less European Cups than us.

No matter what you say about Chelsea, and we’ve said plenty, the identity of this season’s champions will result in one of two statistics: Total triumphs: Chelsea 4 or United 16. It’ll take you just a second to work out the marginally less repellent outcome.