You'll Never Walk Alone

Spying Our Foes in UCL 2007/2008

2007-09-12T23:35:00.000-07:00

Spying Our Foes in UCL 2007/2008

It’s too early to talk about Champion League ? I don’t think so cause one week from now at September 18, 2007 we will take a journey to Portugal against FC Porto.

Drawing Group Stage UCL 2007/2008 result :

RAFA'S REACTION TO CHAMPIONS LEAGUE DRAW
Paul Eaton 30 August 2007

Rafael Benitez has warned his Liverpool side face a tough task to qualify for the knock-out stages of the Champions League following today's draw in Monaco.
The Reds have been placed in Group A of the competition along with Porto, Marseille and Besiktas as they look to enjoy another successful European adventure this term.
"It's clear when you look at some of the other groups that ours could have been easier," said the Reds' boss.
"Porto have good experience in the Champions League and have enjoyed a good record over recent seasons. They will be tough opposition for us.
"Marseille are a good side in the French league and they will know a lot about us which could make it more difficult.
"And you always know when you go to Turkey that it will be hard because of the travelling involved and the wonderful support they give their teams over there.
"I am always confident we can qualify but as ever the key will be winning the home games and picking up results away."

Full Schedule :

September
18 Porto (away)

October
3 Marseille (home)
24 Besiktas (away)

November
6 Besiktas (home)
28 Porto (home)

December
11 Marseille (away))

Our Squad in UCL 2007 taken from http://www.uefa.com

Goalkeepers
Pepe Reina
Charles Itandje
David Martin

Defenders
Sami Hyypiä
Jamie Carragher
John Arne Riise
Steve Finnan
Álvaro Arbeloa
Daniel Agger
Fabio Aurelio
Stephen Darby
Robert Threlfall
Jack Hobbs

Midfielders
Yossi Benayoun
Steven Gerrard
Harry Kewell
Jermaine Pennant
Xabi Alonso
Mohamed Sissoko
Javier Mascherano
Ryan Flynn
Sebastian Leto
Lucas Leiva
Ray Putterill
Jay Spearing

Forwards
Andriy Voronin
Dirk Kuyt
Peter Crouch
Fernando Torres
Ryan Babel
Craig Lindfield

Manager: Rafael Benitez

Liverpool face familiar foes
Thursday 30 August 2007

Last season's runners-up Liverpool FC will begin their quest for a sixth European Champion Clubs' Cup in UEFA Champions League Group A which includes two sides, FC Porto and Olympique de Marseille, who they have met in European competition in recent seasons.

Recent meetings
The Merseyside club ousted the Portuguese side from the UEFA Cup quarter-finals in 2000/01 and went on to lift the trophy, although Marseille proved too strong when the teams met in the UEFA Cup fourth round three years later. Marseille – who signed forward Djibril Cissé and midfielder Boudewijn Zenden from Anfield this summer – went on to reach the final where they were beaten by Valencia CF, who were then coached by the current Liverpool manager Rafael Benítez. Beşiktaş JK are also in the section, meaning another return to Istanbul, the city where Liverpool won the last of their five European Cups in 2005.

Rafael Benítez, Liverpool manager
It's clear when you look at some of the other groups that ours could have been easier. Porto have good experience in the Champions League and have enjoyed a good record over recent seasons. They will be tough opposition for us. Marseille are a good side in Ligue 1 and they will know a lot about us which could make it more difficult. And you always know when you go to Turkey that it will be hard because of the travelling involved and the wonderful support they give their teams over there. I am always confident we can qualify but as ever the key will be winning the home games and picking up results away.

Vítor Baía, Porto external relations director
These kind of draws are always quite even. For what we have done in this competition and with our potential we have all the qualities to go further. Anfield is one of the most difficult grounds and Liverpool have strengthened their team and have a good history in UEFA club competition. Marseille are a very different side now and have Cissé as their attacking spearhead. Beşiktaş have [former Sporting Clube de Portugal midfielder Rodrigo] Tello, Ricardinho and some very good Turkish players.

José Anigo, Marseille sporting director
It is not so bad. We can do something interesting. We know Porto very well. They have a great striker [Ricardo] Quaresma. As for Liverpool, we might have a chance for revenge on Rafael Benítez. We know Anfield well, Djibril and Bolo have played there already. Djibril wanted Liverpool. We have a chance to go through and I'm satisfied.

Ertuğrul Sağlam, Beşiktaş coach
Our aim will be to qualify for the next round. We have a high-quality team. Me and my staff believe we can go through. There is no need to evaluate the teams that we have drawn individually, because all of them are world renowned.

Let’s begin with FC Porto

FC PORTO

Goalkeepers
Helton
Nuno
Ventura

Defenders
Bruno Alves
Pedro Emanuel
Milan Stepanov
Marek Čech
José Bosingwa
Jorge Fucile
João Paulo
Lino

Midfielders
Przemysław Kaźmierczak
Castro
Rui Pedro
Leandro Lima
Luis Aguiar
Mario Bolatti
Paulo Assunção
Ricardo Quaresma
Luis "Lucho" González
Raul Meireles

Forwards
Tarik Sektioui
Ernesto Farías
Hélder Postiga
Lisandro López
Mariano González
Adriano
Edgar
Bruno Moraes

Manager: Jesualdo Ferreira

Dragon Stadium :

FC Porto is ex Maurinho club, I think bad experience two years ago when we met Benfica can be a lesson for Benitez. Ricardo Quaresma will make our Defenders busy, maybe Benitez should set Arbeloa for covering him.

OLYMPIQUE MARSEILLE

Goalkeepers
Sébastien Mate
Mehdi Sennaoui
Sébastien Hamel
Steve Mandanda (on loan from Le Havre AC)

Defenders
Taye Ismaila Taiwo
Julien Rodriguez
Jacques Faty
Leyti N'Diaye
Ronald Zubar
Habib Beye
Laurent Bonnart
Mame N'Diaye
Pape M'Bow
Hassoun Camara
Gael Givet

Midfielders
Karim Ziani
Benoit Cheyrou
Wilson Oruma
Boudewijn Zenden
Salim Arrache
Samir Nasri
Mathieu Valbuena
André Ayew
Modeste M'Bami
Vincent Gragnic
Lorik Cana

Forwards
Djibril Cissé
Mamadou Niang
Fabrice Fiorèse
Matt Moussilou

Manager: Albert Emon

Stade Velodrome stadium

We lost aggregate 3-2 from Marseille in fourth round UEFA League2003/2004. 1-1 in Anfield and 1-2 in Stade Velodrome.
Marseille playing not too bad last season but in this season they not in their best perform yet. From the latest game we must careful to Mamadou Niang, Our former forward Djibril Cisse, and the new France star Samir Nasri. We also meet Zenden there.

BESIKTAS J.K.

Goalkeepers
Hakan Arıkan
Korcan Çelikay
Murat Şahin
Atilla Özmen
Rüştü Reçber

Defenders
Mustafa Doğan
Gökhan Zan
Baki Mercimek
Serdar Kurtuluş
Lamine Diatta
İbrahim Üzülmez
Ali Tandoğan
Koray Şanlı
Koray Avcı
İbrahim Toraman
İbrahim Kaş

Midfielders
Mehmet Sedef
Mehmet Yozgatlı
Burak Yılmaz
Matías Delgado
Rodrigo Tello
Ricardinho
Édouard Cissé
Aydın Karabulut
Serdar Özkan
İbrahim Akın

Forwards
Federico Higuaín
Mert Nobre
Bobô
Batuhan Karadeniz

Manager: Ertuğrul Sağlam

Inonu Stadium

Besiktas not too special but they have very fanatic fans. In Anfield maybe we not have too much problem but in away game Edouard Cisse, Rustu Recber, Mustafa Dogan and Ricardinho are player to watch

From one Besiktas fans :

Our formation is, Hakan,Serdar Kurtuluş İ.Toraman Gökhan İ.Üzülmez, Serdar Özkan Cisse Tello Ricardinho Delgado, Bobo, our two goalkeepers Hakan and Rustu, and all four defenders are national team's senior players.
Eduard Cisse came from PSG and Rodrigo Tello came from Sporting this summer.
Matias Delgado is an ex-Basel player maybe you know (scored all 3 besiktas' goals in 3rd qualifying rd win over FC Zurich) Ricardinho played for Brazil at 2006 World Cup.
And Bobo is our best player on the squad. He played for U-19 Brazil team three years ago. He is only 22, and very talented player. Bordeaux offered 8 million euro for him this summer but rejected. Our weakness is being very young and so inexperienced for at this level. We won all three matches in league and shares with first place with Galatasaray.
and i hope we get a second place.

This is our Champions trophy :

So… how about you? What’s your prediction ?

Another Side of Fowler

2007-09-08T20:48:00.000-07:00

Another Side of Fowler

Robbie Fowler is the wealthiest sportsman in Britain, a property tycoon, racehorse owner and goalscoring phenomenon. So why do many people think he is a football failure? In a remarkably candid interview he talks exclusively to Sarah Edworthy about drug addiction, his astonishing early success, and why he should still be playing for Liverpool

We are standing in a spacious kitchen painted a dusky pink colour that, were it a lipstick or nail varnish, would be called Plum Beautiful or Berry Sorbet. On the large pine dresser stand baby photographs, christening snaps and paint-your-own ceramic plates daubed with the sentiments 'I love you Daddy' and 'To the best Daddy in the world'. Children's reward charts are pinned to a wall and here, in this orderly world of Aga and shiny marble worktops, Robbie Fowler, with a toddler's pink hair clip in his hand, is showing me a recipe for a Bedazzled Fairy Mountain cake.

The Toxteth Terror, eh? Having met Robbie on several occasions through his great mate Steve McManaman, I've always found him reserved but friendly, generous and endearingly quick with deadpan one-liners. For the purposes of this meeting, however, I canvassed a number of people and found plenty who are more convinced by the caricature of a boozing, immature, overpaid footballer on the slide to oblivion. As Fowler told me when we met at his home in Caldy on the Wirral - where somewhere through the trees Rafael Benitez, Jerzy Dudek and Ian Rush are neighbours - it is an image that annoys him because it is profoundly untrue. 'I'm just not like that,' he says flatly. His Scouse accent is not of the pronounced sing-song variety.

Critics of Fowler, who was 30 in April, like to call to mind three images when they speak about him: the notorious line-sniffing goal celebration against Everton in April 1999; the moment when he taunted Graeme Le Saux during a game at Chelsea; and the odd worse-for-wear snatched nightclub photograph. Never mind Robbie's side of these stories (of which, more later) or the universal truth that one man's prank is another's vexation. Those images tick the boxes of three taboos for those with role-model status - drugs, sex and drink.

At the same time, Fowler is held in huge affection for being 'mischievous, but a good guy'; 'a true Liverpool kid'; and 'a record-breaking scorer of supernatural precision'. And he is lamented for being forced out of Liverpool, as some would have it, by former manager Gerard Houllier.

The official club website states simply: 'Robbie Fowler is a Liverpool legend and a Kop hero who will never be forgotten.' He was a sensation from the moment he scored on his debut, against Fulham, in the Coca Cola Cup on 22 September 1993. In the return game, at Anfield, he scored five. Less than a year later, against Arsenal on 28 August 1994, the 19-year-old scored what remains the fastest hat-trick in the Premiership (in four minutes, 32 seconds), already on his way to becoming the fastest Liverpool striker in history to 100 goals. On 1 November 1994, Liverpool drew up a contract that made him football's first teenage millionaire. He was 19 and would go on to score 171 goals in 330 games.

'Everyone was saying, "He's too young",' Graeme Souness, who gave Fowler his debut during his troubled time as Liverpool manager, told me when we spoke. 'But I would go and watch him in the reserves - it would be a misty November night, there would be a throng around the goal, the ball would end up in the back of the net and I would say, "That's Robbie who's got that", and it always was. He had a fantastic sixth sense of where to be, a unique eye for a goal. He could conjure them from nothing. I would put him right up there with Ian Rush as one of the greatest poachers.' To the Liverpool faithful he was known simply as 'God'.

Since our arrival at God's divine family home - 'Edwardian, would you call it, Robbie?' 'Lived-in, I'd say' - there's been a fluid conversation going on about the fairy mountain birthday cake between Robbie's wife, Kerrie; their three blonde daughters, Madison, six, Jaya, four, and Mackenzie, two; and Kerrie's mother, Maureen. The girls are on their way to Tesco to buy the ingredients for the cake and Robbie wants to clarify what the excitement is all about.

With the children gone and the photographer setting up, Robbie and I sit outside on a Cliveden-style stone terrace that runs the length of the house. At the far end, neat box hedges retain the formality of a house built in 1910 for a Merseyside ship-company owner. Close to the table where we sit, a pop-up pink Tinkerbell play tent marks the other end, which houses an indoor swimming-pool. In an inner courtyard, washing is neatly pegged out on the line. As we look out over the garden and landscaped playground area, the conversation ranges between trampoline safety (Robbie is a worrier), the usefulness of a heated pool as a means of exhausting young children and the importance of school for building social confidence. All three girls attend a local private school, where they mingle with, among others, Liverpool midfielder Didi Hamann's brood. Away from football, Robbie's idea of an ideal day is, he says, 'to play golf at St Andrews - I've always wanted to play there - come home and mess around with the girls, then go out for a meal with my wife. That would be perfect.'

In truth, Robbie hates going out. 'I get paranoid about people staring at me. Even now I don't deal with people looking at me. I can't do it sometimes. I can't go out. I don't know how to react when people stare. It's not like they're trying to work out if it is me - I've got one of those faces I think that people automatically know. When I was young, meself and Stevie Mac would walk through town. He'd put a cap on and no one would know him, and I'd try and put a cap on but it seemed to make people recognize me more. I couldn't even get away with wearing a cap! I've always liked a laugh but when I look at how I've been portrayed over the years, it's been exaggerated. An image has stuck for most of my career and it isn't flattering. I hate the idea that people are looking at me like I'm some sort of thick, ignorant scally, or thug, who doesn't care about anything.'

This week Robbie Fowler publishes a remarkably candid autobiography. Why? He doesn't need the money: he is, after all, the richest sportsman living in Britain, his estimated fortune of £28 million accumulated from football and his ownership of close to 100 properties. He has also pursued an interest in horse racing, forming the Macca & Growler Partnership with McManaman and owning a string of horses, of whom the best-known and last survivor is Seebald.

Fans delight in teasing him about his property portfolio, singing, to the tune of 'Yellow Submarine', 'We all live in a Robbie Fowler house'. 'They sing another great one, too, something about rent ... ' he laughs. 'The investment is something in the pipeline that I could manage when I retire, but for now I leave all that on the backburner. I've got a financial advisor who deals with it so I can concentrate on football.'

With his close friend David Maddock, he has written his life story animated with intimate, quirky stories as you would expect, but driven primarily by his concern at how he has been misrepresented and at the way certain untruths about him have become undisputed convictions that continue to torture his family. He has never spoken out, for instance, against what he describes as 'the vindictive whispering campaign' about an alleged drugs problem. 'That myth really, really irritates me,' he says firmly. 'If people only knew the reason why I grew up hating drugs so much, maybe they'd have been a little slower to throw this mud at me.' Later, he explains how two of his cousins died through drug abuse and that he had grown up knowing that 'drugs are nothing but evil'.

'What struck me most in working on the book,' he continues, 'was just how far I have come. I've come from living in our house in Toxteth to what I've got now. I've worked hard for it, and I'm proud of that.'

What he shares with most other top-flight English footballers - with, as he puts it, 'Rooney, Stevie Gerrard, Jamie Carragher, Beckham, Scholes, Macca, Joe Cole, Rio Ferdinand' - is an inner-city council-estate childhood. 'Coming from such a background doesn't mean you're thick, or a thug, but it does mean you have a certain outlook on life to begin with.'

Emerging just a year after the Premiership was set up in 1992, when money from Sky was enriching the game, Fowler quickly became famous and wealthy but without the benefit of the media training and lifestyle guidance that many young players receive today. As he writes: 'I was a cheeky little lad who played football every night, pissed around with his mates, and overnight, literally overnight, came fame. Nothing had changed in my routine, except that when I went down the chippy and got me special fried rice, it would be wrapped in a newspaper that had my picture all over it. It's no wonder I struggled to come to terms with it all ... Every game I played, something seemed to happen that made me a little bit more famous, or a little more notorious. I never analysed it, never thought about where I was heading or how I should react. I just reacted how I always reacted, instinctively, cheekily, sometimes stupidly. And I had the time of my life.'

When you're a teenager from inner-city Liverpool, you don't have any training on how to deal with the sideshow that comes with success. 'I've made plenty of mistakes, I know I have, and during my time as a footballer things have changed so that the spotlight is now even more intense. You have to be even more of a role model, a sensible, mature, intelligent professional, even if you're a cheeky little lad who's come from an inner-city council estate and put football before his studies.'

But he always had respect for the game as drilled into him at Liverpool by youth coach Steve Heighway, assistant manager Ronnie Moran and fellow striker Ian Rush. He was taught how to play for the team and how always to pass to the man in the best position. 'It strikes me that these days, clubs don't even want players who can truly play any more; they just want athletes, quick guys who don't have a football brain, can just run and run; some of them, Jesus. I can never imagine acting like that. Have a laugh, yeah, dick about, but don't give it the Charlie Big Bollocks. It's inevitable now, because everyone is a superstar, even if they're just an average player, and maybe that was part of the process set in motion when I signed that contract in 1994.'

Robert Bernard Fowler was born in Liverpool on 9 April 1975, to parents whose families had both lived in Toxteth for generations. His dad was a labourer before he started to work on the railways. Robbie's paternal grandfather was a Liverpool fan who used to dance on the piano in the local pub to celebrate victory. His maternal grandfather, from whom he reckons he's inherited his prankster sense of humour, was a good Catholic, 'who would get a few drinks down him on 12 July when they had the Protestant marches, and he would then go out and lead the parade!'

Born with congenital dislocation of the hips, Robbie was a 'tiny, little kid' who suffered bad asthma, and was known until secondary school as Robert Ryder, his mum's family name before he registered with his father's. 'I had a new identity,' he says of changing his name. 'It was like being James Bond!'

He has a sister, Lisa, a year his senior, and two younger brothers, Anthony and Scott, but his parents never married, nor ever lived together for long under the same roof. 'We were never deprived, even if we weren't loaded,' he says of his childhood. 'If I'm honest, until I got married, I was always at me mum's, even when I had my own flat, and she carried on cooking and washing and ironing for me. And Dad was always there. I reckon he's watched every game I ever played from the age of about 10 and he always took me down to play football and practise, practise, practise. I used to go over the road to his place on Saturdays, watch Match of the Day then fall asleep, and then come back over the next morning.'

An Everton supporter who idolised Graeme Sharp, Fowler's world was contained within three points: home in the council maisonette, school at one end of the road, and the all-weather pitch at the other end. From as early as he can remember, his dad took him to kick balls. 'Wind or rain, snow or shine, we'd be there.'

At the age of six, in the summer of 1981, the Toxteth Riots broke out on his front doorstep. For nine nights 'gangs of lads would start to gather around the top of our road, more and more of them, until it all exploded into carnage'. Rioters charged and smashed windows in the maisonettes. Bottles flew, shops were looted, buildings burnt. Protected by his mother, young Robbie knew little of what was happening. 'I suppose it's funny that, had I been old enough, I could have put the telly on and seen all these pictures of civil war, then opened the curtains and watched it live.'

The charred remains of buildings formed the backdrop to his childhood world, but Fowler is proud to have come from his strong, close, family network in Toxteth. 'If there's one thing that does my head in, it's all the stuff banging on about Toxteth being this **it-hole, the inference being that it was miraculous I managed to claw my way out of there.'

As a teenager his world expanded slightly to encompass pool and footie as well as hanging out at 'the benches', or by a phone box where he and his mates would cold-call people and pretend they'd won prizes. He was a regular at Mick's Chippy for pitta bread and crisps. Even after he was a first-team regular at Liverpool, he was still going to Mick's Chippy for his favourite special fried rice with barbecue sauce. His football routine insulated him from the drugs and crime. 'I never got near the dodgy stuff,' he says. 'Maybe if I'd not been able to kick a ball it would have been different, but I doubt it because all my mates are decent blokes now, just normal fellas with families.'

He recalls the day he received a letter from the Liverpool Schools Football Association asking him to attend a trial at Penny Lane. Once there, he was embarrassed by his scabby pair of boots. It bothered his parents, too, and, though struggling to make ends meet each week, his father greeted him through the school railings one day dangling a new pair of top boots. As Fowler describes the thrills of his early progress, you have a sense of a young boy who inspires affection in his elders. Mr Lynch, for instance - as Robbie and his family still call him to this day - who directed his talent with Liverpool Schoolboys. With the celebrated Liverpool scout, Jim Aspinall, too, he formed a lasting bond. As Aspinall lay dying last year, at the age of 72, Fowler went to visit him in hospital. 'I arrived a few minutes too late so I never got to thank him for all he did for me and tell him how much he meant to me,' he says.

Kenny Dalglish, Liverpool manager from 1985 to 1991, was aware of Robbie's early promise and instructed Aspinall to 'get me that little Robbie Ryder at all costs'. Dalglish, who graduated from being the club's star striker, watched Fowler closely once he was attending the club's academy and made a point of happening to be around when Robbie and his father were invited to meet the players. On one occasion, Dalglish even gave them a lift to Toxteth in his large white Mercedes. Dalglish thought they had said Croxteth, which is on the way to where he lived in Southport, but happily switched direction. 'I took an eternity to get out of the car, with Kenny Dalglish hanging out the window saying goodbye,' he says. 'But you know what, not one of my mates walked by, and not one of the neighbours stuck their heads out their windows, even though they were all nosey buggers!'

To Fowler, signing a three-year YTS apprenticeship in 1991 was fulfilment of the ultimate dream. He would clean out the bath, clean the boots and the changing rooms, and hang out the kit. 'I never minded the shitty jobs and I loved being around all the top men like Rushie and John Barnes and Macca.'

Then it was the reserves and the impatient wait for a first-team opportunity. That came soon enough when, at the age of 18, Graeme Souness gave him his debut, playing alongside Ian Rush. Naturally, he scored. 'He scored from day one,' recalls McManaman. 'He emerged with a bang, instantly a hero, instantly breaking records. I remember that time so well. We were both young, both Scousers playing for Liverpool. It was fantastic. He is the best finisher I ever saw.'

Back then, Fowler hadn't yet worked out how to celebrate - 'I sort of had this two-fisted thing, just looking around with a big stupid grin on me face' - but fans would pick him up in the street, put him on their shoulders and walk off singing his praises. He was on a rollercoaster and was soon being asked for his autograph by Nelson Mandela and Robbie Williams.

Was he successful too soon? Schooled in the old ways of football, he entered the game just as its entire culture was about to be radically changed.

'I was a boy, suddenly treated like the men and expected to act like them,' he says, reflecting on his glorious early years when he seemed destined for greatness, with both Liverpool and England. 'When I emerged Liverpool had a tradition of their players working hard and playing hard, back before the Nineties and through all the glory era. When I got there, all the pasta and science stuff hadn't quite caught on in England - things that were perfectly acceptable then wouldn't be tolerated now. We had some characters, too, some lively boys who could teach a wide-eyed little kid a thing or two. So I had an introduction to the old way of doing things, just as the whole mentality began to change in football.'

McManaman recalls a typical prank during Euro 96 in England. 'Bob Wilson and Jack Charlton were broadcasting one night at 10.30pm from Burnham Beeches,' he says. 'All of the players could see it was going out live, so Gazza and Robbie sneaked out and danced around behind them in their dressing gowns. We were inside, in hysterics, watching it half on telly and half out of the window. It was harmless fun, but needless to say it was judged on.'

Fowler thinks his uncouth image arises from such harmless, early pranks. There is certainly a gulf between the spirit in which some controversial incidents came about and how they were received. The Le Saux confrontation, for example, Fowler explains away simply as a case of his retaliating verbally against a defender's repeated, discreet use of a flying elbow. He remembered how violently Le Saux had reacted when David Batty, his team-mate at Blackburn, had baselessly called him a 'poof', and so chose to pursue the same line. Le Saux responded thus: 'But I'm married!' To which Fowler replied: 'So was Elton John, mate.' Cue: another elbow from Le Saux; followed by Fowler's shorts-down gesture.

On another, more benign, occasion Fowler pulled up his shirt after scoring against Brann Bergen, in a European game in March 1997, to reveal a mock Calvin Klein T-shirt in support of striking Liverpool dockers. McManaman was wearing one, too, and they had agreed between them to swap shirts with the opposition at the end of the game to register their support for the dockers, but subtly. Uefa fined Fowler £900. Two days earlier Fowler had received a personal fax from Sepp Blatter in which Fifa's president praised the way he had tried to encourage the referee to reverse a decision awarding him a penalty in a game against Arsenal at Highbury, when, he told the referee in vain, he had not been fouled by opposing goalkeeper David Seaman.

Fowler says that he has been tested for drugs use every year since he came into the game and has nothing to hide. 'Let me say now, once and for all, that the stories are not true. Not now, not then, not ever. It is an insult to me, and an insult to me mum and dad.' What he reveals in his book, in an understated way and out of respect for an aunt, is that both his cousin Vincent, with whom he used to play football, and Vincent's sister Tracy are both dead because of drugs. 'I'll never forget him [Vincent] and even now, every day, it breaks my heart and that of everyone in our family to think what happened. His mum, me Auntie Pat, obviously finds it so hard even now when I talk about it, and I don't want to make it any worse for her. But she also lost her daughter Tracy, who got involved with a bloke who was on drugs, and he killed her. If people could see what a devastating effect it has all had on her [Auntie Pat], how she has to live with it every day of her life, then I don't think they would be making jokes about drugs, and about me taking them.'

Fowler's father, Bobby, is sure that the rumours about his son were started by Everton fans. When 'smackhead' was daubed, in 10-foot letters, over his mother's house, Robbie felt his family had endured enough. Which leads us to the notorious goal celebration in front of away fans when he scored in a derby at Anfield - 'not the smartest move', he concedes.

'I realise I shouldn't have been so obvious in taunting the Everton fans, but I couldn't believe how much stick I got over the next few weeks. The message I was sending out there, which was completely clear in my mind, was that if I was supposed to be a smackhead, how the f*** could I score goals against Everton and rub their faces in the dirt? How could I be a top sportsman and do everything I have if I was taking all that **it? It was a way of telling them that if they carried on with all that abuse, then I was going to stuff it up them even more. It was an attempt to get them to think about what they were doing, and even make them stop. And it was supposed to be funny.'

McManaman says that the drug taunts are as insidious as racism. 'Everton fans have always been terrible to Robbie because he's scored important goals against them. Maybe they think, because he's a Scouser, one of their own, they can get away with it, but the vitriol really stepped over the line. No player minds being called **it or fat, or taking a tremendous amount of stick, but to make up a culture of falsehoods, as they did with Robbie and drugs, was shocking. It really got out of hand. In that situation, it is a big ask of a player to remember to put your role-model status first before defending yourself when your family are subjected to horrible things as well. It is too easy for fans to say, "I pay over £20 for my ticket, I pay your wages, therefore I can do and say appalling things whenever I want". There is a line that should not be crossed.'

'When you come from Toxteth,' Fowler has said, 'you don't start moaning about "the price of fame", but what about my family? My wife Kerrie is the nicest person on earth and together we have brought our three girls up properly, to respect people and have decent values. How does Kerrie feel when she hears the rumours that, let's face it, reflect equally on her? What will my three children feel when they get to understand what "smackhead" means and that their dad has been called it all his professional life?

"Look, I'm no fucking saint, I've pulled plenty of stunts in my time, and I've not always behaved in the right way. But just because I'm from Toxteth doesn't mean I have to be a druggie. In my mind, that's what it boils down to. You're from a certain place that has problems with drugs in certain small areas, so you have to behave in a certain way. Never mind that the majority of families in Toxteth are decent, hard-working people, who have the same sort of values as everyone else. And never mind that your mum and dad, the people who pride themselves on bringing you up right, get a kick in the teeth every time some smart-arse has a cheap dig at your expense.'

On May 25 this year, Robbie Fowler travelled to Istanbul to watch the European Cup final. 'I was like every other Liverpool fan that night. I was over me head,' he tells me. 'What made it sweeter was that ever since the Olympiakos game no one gave them a chance, first to beat them by two goals, to play Chelsea, to play Juventus, even AC Milan; no one was giving them a chance. It fired them all up.'

In the celebrations afterwards the players he had once captained expressed regret that he had not been there on the pitch with them and blamed Houllier for forcing him out of the club. 'Obviously, deep down, I was thinking maybe it could have been me lifting the trophy, I could have been there on the pitch, but I never moped about it,' he says. 'I don't want to say in an ideal world - because that would be disrespectful to Leeds and Manchester City - but I do wonder what might have happened [if he had stayed at Liverpool]. If things had been going according to my plan, I would still be there.'

In five seasons under Graeme Souness and Roy Evans, Fowler won only one trophy, the 1995 League Cup. In his third and final full season with Houllier he won the treble of League Cup, FA Cup and Uefa Cup. It was, he says, 'the greatest season of my career, and also one of the worst'. Fowler's version of what he regards as Houllier's desire to force him out is shocking, as it was at the time to those in the know. During the painful period before his inevitable departure from Anfield, he received calls of support from Kenny Dalglish, Ian Rush and John Aldridge.

'I've always thought it was wrong for players to leave clubs and have a go at managers or personnel who were at the club. You should just leave, and leave on good terms. It is clear that meself and Gerard never got on, but I don't think I've mullered him in the book. I've just been honest about the way he treated me and I treated him.'

Fowler writes bluntly: 'He [Houllier] lied to me', in a reference to a private promise to make him central to plans at Liverpool. Emile Heskey and Michael Owen started more games than Fowler, who was not played regularly enough to hit his rhythm. He endured regular dressing-downs in front of embarrassed team-mates. Fowler writes that Houllier used the influential Liverpool Echo to make fans question his form and attitude, briefing a young, raw reporter, Chris Bascombe, against him, even telephoning the writer to berate him if he had praised Fowler in a game. (Bascombe later explained in detail Houllier's tactics, having wised up when pressured to do the same with Owen.)

The manager argued that Fowler and Owen could not play together - but they emphatically disproved the theory, for England in Greece in June 2001. Robbie was named man of the match. But Houllier, 'the man who claimed he never missed a football match in Europe' according to Robbie, astonishingly just 'said he hadn't seen it' when asked by the local press.

He is more forgiving of former assistant manager Phil Thompson, with whom he often clashed. 'I've met him a few times since we've both been away from Liverpool and he's a totally different person. I couldn't believe it. At Liverpool he was a bit in yer face, if you like. But since he got released he's a totally different person, someone I didn't mind. With him and Gerard, it was a bit Jekyll and Hyde.'

The sense of injustice may be powerful, but he says he would swap only one thing in his entire time at Liverpool: the last game he played, against Sunderland at home, on 25 November 2001, when he was substituted at half-time to strengthen the midfield. 'That kind of sums up my time under Houllier,' is his verdict.

What of the notion that he has squandered his talent, that he should still be playing for England, for whom he last appeared in the 2002 World Cup? 'I'm still working hard,' he says. He concedes that he is more insecure than many would imagine an international to be. 'I sometimes think I've needed a bit of an arm around me in my career - which I've not always got from certain managers and coaches who didn't understand me.'

Stuart Pearce, who succeeded Kevin Keegan as manager of Manchester City in March, has encouraged Fowler with a more paternal approach. After describing himself as 'a cabbage' during his first two seasons at City, Fowler lists coming in the top three of the supporters' player-of-the-season awards last season as one of his proudest achievements (defender Richard Dunne came first).

Meeting him at home, it is clear he has attempted to remain true to himself and his Toxteth background throughout his thrilling and often troubled career. 'When you come from a council estate in Liverpool, how you come across is important,' he says, speaking for himself but also McManaman. 'You don't want to be seen as a biff: some busy bollocks like Gary Neville, or someone who has sold their soul like Beckham. The mates we've got, if either of us gives it the big bollocks, then they'd destroy us. Steve's like me, he's got mates from when he was a kid who knew him when he was two-foot nothing and had holes in his kecks. He'd be mortified if they thought he was getting above himself, or playing the big star, and I feel exactly the same way. Sometimes, I think that's why we both come across as if we don't give a f***, and I think that's why a few managers - England managers in particular - haven't understood the pair of us.'

As I prepare to leave, Fowler beckons me over to his mother-in-law's car. A small dog is hurling itself at the window, doing a good impression of an enraged guard-dog. 'Watch this,' says Robbie, with a grin. He opens the door boldly and the dog, relaxing, slinks over to the other side of the car. All it craves is a bit of reassurance. What is it they say about first impressions?

This original article is :

http://www.big-reds.org/

Taken from :

The Observer

Sunday September 4, 2005

Don't look back in anger

And this is the latest record of Fowler's goals..

We, United and Chelsea summary

2007-09-07T19:26:00.000-07:00

We, United and Chelsea summary

What’s the different about Liverpool this season and The Reds old version, when Benitez came as new manager in the beginning 2004/2005 ? Right now we’re not afraid anymore to “playing hard” with another club in the middle and bottom table league.
As example is the latest victory against Derby County in Anfield, We do excellent in ball possession (59%-41%) and a little different in foult (10-14).
A brilliant “Rafalution style” running well without two most familiar faces Jamie Carragher and The Captain Steven Gerrard. In this game Samy Hyypia and Daniel Agger solve the problem about Liverpool’s backside fissured.

Our defense protected very carefully since Javier Mascherano and Xabi Alonso be a good shield across The Rams’s attack. This positive indication completed our superior technique and making Rafael Benitez very-very proud. The Spaniard who usually calm sure this good mood will long time continous because our squad very versatile. “we almost having two good players in every position” Benitez said.
Specificly Rafa commend about Fernando Torres performing, who making two goals against The Rams. He said Torres very clever because not let loose his amazing skill since first week and make the opposite inattentive.
See the Premiership Table League, only four team which is never unbeaten. Who will be the last team with 100% the longest unbeatable ?. consideration Newcastle and Blackburn many expert says Liverpool and Arsenal more favourite. The calculation bring us to the changing prediction about who will be Our stronger competitor until the end of this season, especially after Chelsea down 0-2 in Villa Park. One day before, Manchester United beat Sunderland 1-0 with no convinced style, or rhythm control which is inclined their trade mark previously.
In fact Red Devils must hardly struggle in Old Trafford before helped from the lost boy goal, Louis Saha. Ferguson’s happy face after United won from Roy Keane’s boys clearly describing Him unsatisfied for His squad performing.
That is Fergie and now about Mourinho, different than Ferguson, Mourinho precisely deny their lose. After utterly defeat Zat Knight header’s and Agbonlahor’s strike, Jose Mourinho still praise his boy’s quality.
The Former of FC Porto manager not admit that in the second half The Blues only have two shoot on target. “ I personally count at least ten shoot on target and the boy’s make a good reaction after the first goal. The mistake is we let the first goal happen in the beginning of the first half from one corner kick. That’s changing all my plans,” he said to premier plus.
Well..the statistic says Chelsea only make eight accurate shoot in 90 minutes normal time.
One thing..although it’s too early talking about the second champion candidate (the 1st is We of course), the statistic is change right now, we don’t need wait too long to see the two most rich Premiership Team falling down.

Aston Villa 2 vs 0 Chelsea

PORTSMOUTH ? VS ? LIVERPOOL

2007-09-07T02:59:00.000-07:00

PORTSMOUTH ? VS ? LIVERPOOL

Next game at Saturday 15 September We will make a journey to Fratton Park. Last time We met Portsmouh was late July in Hongkong during the Barclay’s Asia Trophy. Portsmouth won the game on penalties after 0-0 normal time.
Harry Redknapp buy some new weapon this summer likes Hermann Hreidarsson, Jhon Utaka, David Nugent and Sulley Muntari. Our former defender Djimi Traore maybe in the starting eleven against us for Portsmouth.

In the last season We only can make 0-0 final result in Anfield and lost 2-1 in Fratton Park. All goals from Benjani,Niko Kranjcar and Samy Hyypia.
Our last Victory at Fratton Park was May 7th 2006 (3-1),our goals from Robbie Fowler, Peter Crouch and Djibril Cisse.

So..how about next game? Do you have a prediction ? or last game review. We invite you here to write your review or next game prediction and get linkback to your site for free (actually it’s not about linkback,it’s about HOW REDS ARE YOU ?),

You can send it to arentcity@gmail.com or gl0ucester@yahoo.com. Your prediction or review will be add in 24 hours after we receive it.
No bad words please…

This Video is From two sides met in Barclay's Asia Trophy in Hongkong

Start of new season

2007-09-06T20:10:00.000-07:00

Start of new season

We make a good start in this season..please watch the video..,

And this is statistic from lates game against Derby County

Liverpool 6-0 Derby County

We Sinkin’ Derby in every line. A half dozen goal is the prove, four goal from Torres and Alonso. Alonso making an amazing opening goal by 40 m set pieces. Another two goals is from Babel and Voronin.

Referee : Alan Willey
Stadium : Anfield (44.076)
Goals : Xabi Alonso 27’
Ryan Babel 43’
Fernando Torres 56’
Xabi Alonso ‘69
Andrey Voronin ‘76
Fernando Torres 78’
Corners : 4-2
Yellow Card : Griffin 66’ (D)
Red Card : --

Liverpool ( 4-4-2 )

25- Pepe Reina
3- Steve Finnan
4- Samy Hyypia
5- Daniel Agger
17- Alvaro Arbeloa
16- Jermaine Pennant (11- Yossi Benayoun 61’)
14- Xabi Alonso
20- Javier Mascherano (22- Momo Sissoko 77’)
19- Ryan Babel (10 Andrey Voronin 73’)
18- Dirk Kuyt
9- Fernando Torres

Substitute : 30- Charles Itandje
6- Jhon Arne Riise

Coach : Rafael Benitez

Derby County ( 5-3-2)

42- Bywater
3- M.Camara (McEveley 63’)
18- C. Davis
17- Todd
24- Mears
18- Griffin (23- D.Moore 80’)
25- Pearson
8- Oakley
21- Malcolm (16- Teale 59’)
11- Fagan
9- S. Howard

Substitute :1- Price
:10- Earnshaw

Coach : Billy Davies

Man Of The Match

Xabi Alonso (Liverpool)

RAFAEL BENITEZ MAUDES

2007-09-06T03:21:00.000-07:00

Rafael Benítez Maudes (born April 16, 1960, Madrid, Spain) is a Spanish football manager and former player, also referred to as Rafa Benítez or sometimes Rafa. He has been manager of Liverpool F.C. since June 2004. On June 2, 2006, Benítez signed a new four-year deal with Liverpool. He has previously managed Valencia CF and five other La Liga teams. Benítez became the most successful Valencia CF manager in their history after just three seasons in charge. In 2002, he led the club to their first La Liga title since 1971, and in 2004 he led the club to a La Liga/UEFA Cup double. In 2005 he guided Liverpool to victory in the UEFA Champions League in Istanbul, Turkey and the European Super Cup and in 2006 he led them to victory in the FA Cup (against Westham United In final) and the FA Community Shield (against Chelsea). But in 2006 Liverpool only runner up UEFA Champions League (2-0 down against AC Milan in Athena). In the same season in Premier League Liverpool finish #3 after Manchester United and Chelsea.

Benítez became only the third manager, after Bob Paisley and José Mourinho, to win the UEFA Cup and UEFA Champions League in successive seasons. He is also the first manager to achieve this with two different clubs. He became the second Liverpool manager, after Joe Fagan, to win the European Cup/UEFA Champions League in his first season in charge. Throughout his career Benítez has also won several individual awards. He was awarded Manager Of the Year titles by both Don Balón and El País in 2002 while at Valencia CF and was named Madrid Coach of the Year for 2005 by Seven Stars Sport.

Benítez has achieved success at both Valencia CF and Liverpool FC with mainly inherited squads. Of the fourteen players used in the 2005 UEFA Champions League Final, twelve were at Liverpool when Benítez arrived. However, his transfer policy at Liverpool of bringing exciting young players from around the world indicate he is trying to build his own squad to compete on all fronts.

The Reds new owners Tom Hicks and George Gillett provided Benitez with additional transfer funds for the new season to attempt to bridge the gap to Premiership rivals Manchester United and Chelsea. Some observers commented it would be interesting to see how Benitez coped with having a "blank chequebook" as it was a situation he had never experienced in his managerial career.

He broke Liverpool's transfer record to sign Spanish striker Fernando “ el nino ” Torres (I like Torres especially after him two goals vs Derby County) from Athletico Madrid as well as signing young Dutch winger Ryan Babel, West Ham winger Yossi Benayoun, Andriy Voronin on a bosman and Brazilian midfielder Lucas Pezzini Leiva. During the pre-season he also invested in a number of young foreign players such as Bulgarian under-21 goalkeeper Nicolay Mihaylov and Krisztian Nemeth. Charles Itandje was signed as cover for Pepe Reina after Scott Carson (Carson playing well when Aston Villa beat Chelsea 2-0 last week, two goals from (16) Zat Knight and (11) Agbonlahor. Ashley Young is man of the match) was reluctantly loaned to Aston Villa for the season.

Benitez also sold several players in the summer, including fan-favourites Robbie “the God” Fowler (Fowler is retired ?), Luis García and Jerzy Dudek also Craig Bellamy, who fell out of favour with Benitez following the golf-club incident with John Arne Riise.

Benitez also tried to sign left-back Gabriel Heinze from Manchester United (the bad news is United got Tevez from Westham,did you see how Tevez Struggling to save Westham last season ?), however on August 21 2007, an FA panel ruled that Manchester United were under no obligation to sell Heinze to a rival club. Traditionally, players do not transfer between these fierce rivals and many supporters were surprised at Benitez' determination to sign a player from a team his team's fan's dislike intently. The outcome of this saga caused Benitez to launch a stinging attack on the The FA's treatment of Liverpool and percieved bias towards Manchester United.
The Reds made a good start to the new season, going unbeaten in August and topping the Premier League table for the first time under Benitez after a comprehensive 6-0 win over Derby County (Alonso 27’, Babel 45’, Torres 56’, Alonso 69’, Voronin 76’, Torres 78’). They conceded just two goals in this period, both penalties, the second of which controversially denied our victory against Chelsea. The referee in question, Rob Styles, has since apologised to Benitez for his error.