Not right as rain in cycle as old as the seasons

IT NEVER rains but it pours, so they say. Whilst our woes could hardly be called torrential and a flood warning would be hysterical in the extreme, there is a tiny yet discernible trickling around the ankles.

You half expect Rafa to sing a bar or two of that miserable Travis song at every press conference nowadays.

He’ll be starting his own scapegoat farm soon. Moaning about another international break raised eyebrows skywards. Not this nonsense again, we thought. Then Torres tore something or other — in a training session for added ire — and we all joined in on harmonies and percussion.

I see Keane missed a golden chance against Germany from more or less the same spot he scored against us. Twice. Somebody up there is rubbing it in a tad.

Harping on about obstacles tends to become a self-fulfilling prophecy, this coming from one of the world’s foremost miserables. Observing life from beneath a cloak of suffocating darkness is meant to dilute the pain and disillusionment of a long-suffering football fan. Forewarned, forearmed, etc.

I’m here to tell you this is a steaming wave of horse fumes. Those who had a tiny inkling our good start was a mere deception still feel as deflated and bemused as the suckers who fell for it.

International week should have brought a period of calm reflection but if anything it’s made matters worse and the arguments get fiercer, with uncanny echoes of 2002/03 when it began to go wrong for the previous regime.

Early optimism dashed, Gerrard in pitiful form, unforeseen struggles in Europe (thanks to Rafa’s Valencia, bizarrely) and a manager with an escalating excuse count. It’s a cycle as old as the seasons.

Out of the next five league games, four are traditionally difficult: Everton, Blackburn and Newcastle away plus a rejuvenated Arsenal at home. Try and find anyone remotely looking forward to that little lot.

Interestingly enough, Monsieur Henry has admitted that his presence may have been one of the stifling factors in Arsenal’s recent failures. When I suggested Gerrard might be doing likewise at Anfield, I was called amongst other things a certain part of the female anatomy and I don’t mean eyelash.

While amateur psychologists search for reasons why he’s playing badly, it was hardly comforting to note he stinks just as pungently for England.

This being Rumour City, it isn’t possible for a footballer to simply have a bad run of form, of course. But never fear everybody, Harry Kewell’s on his way back. When fans are banking on the one footballer who makes Louis Saha look like Douglas Bader, there can surely be no more straws in the world left to hold on to.

I raised a topic on the website about what Reds expected this season, given we’d spent no small sum. It was obvious most respondents would emphasise the league. We’ve only done this three times in 16 years, which is risible for a club of this size. Evans just about managed it twice and Houllier preserved our dreams till the last week of April 2002.

This discussion evoked further reminiscences about the calamitous season that followed. Moores eventually kept Le Boss on but denied him any significant funds to do the job properly.

Understandable perhaps, given the purchases of Diouf, Diao and Cheyrou the previous summer, but why keep a manager if you don’t trust him to spend your money? That €50 million or so given to Benitez will become extremely important. I suspect this will be the first of many references to that tidy sum.

Billionaires tend not to be frivolous with their hard-earned cash, and our American owners have gone conspicuously quiet. If the gap between the top and ourselves continues to grow, discussions about the future will build and build, in my experience getting nastier the longer it drags on.

No doubt I’ll be asked if I’ve ever managed at the highest level. I’ve forgotten what I said the last three times this ‘argument’ was put to me.

Something tells me I’d better refresh my memory — and fast.