Five Reasons to Watch Football This Weekend

Liverpool Need to Get Their Dross Firing
​In the week, Brendan Rodgers stood up and told the world with a straight face what a great performance and result it was to draw 2-2 with Ludogorets. It's worth remembering here what a deserved kicking Roy Hodgson got during his time at Liverpool for as "that famous win over Trabzonspor" – the perils of sounding as out-of-touch as showbiz gossip columnists having to write about footballers and coming out with "footie ace Jermaine Pennant" are very real. But the omens in Liverpool's current predicament stretch back to a time before Hodgson, even.

It was way back in 2009, the last ride of the Sky Four, when a Liverpool side fresh from their closest title challenge in years imploded and finished seventh. Benitez may be a joke now, but in their stride his side were just as scary as Suarez and Sturridge at their peak, crushing a great United team 4-1 at Old Trafford and absolutely destroying Real Madrid.

While the high water mark of Rodgers' Liverpool reign to date came while 3-0 up at Selhurst Park, Benitez's was after taking the lead against Arsenal for the last time in a 4-4 where Andrey Arshavin ran riot. Neither side could recover from the blow, and spent the next year staggering from disaster to disaster. Back then we had the beachball, and now we have Dejan Lovren's impression of one.

So, what went wrong? Both sides consisted of an indomitable strike partnership backed up by a rabble of cloggers and journeymen. It wasn't sustainable, too top-heavy, the equivalent of heading for a night out on three hours' sleep, two lines of speed and a double espresso. At some point, it's really gonna hit you hard.

There were differences: Benitez never lost Torres or Gerrard, and he also had Alonso and Mascherano. The key though is getting the best out of your relative dross – Lucas Leiva, Dirk Kuyt and Yossi Benayoun hadn't suddenly matured into world-class players overnight, they were jobbers on a purple patch, and the same is true now of the likes of Jordan Henderson and Joe Allen. The league is won by whoever has the best shit players – it's not a romantic truth, but it is the truth, and Rodgers has to find a way to get his supporting cast of 6.5s playing like 8s if he wants to keep his job.

Ronald Koeman pic.twitter.com/oTPW79Gdkw

— Eamo (@EamoV1) August 17, 2014

A Chance for Southampton and Man City to Show Their Ambitions
​Southampton slipped up last week in failing to overcome a pretty rancid Aston Villa side, but they get the big chance to show everyone what they're made of this week. Beat Man City and suddenly they look like genuine top four contenders – lose, and it looks pretty inevitable they'll give way to tedious United and Arsenal resurgences.

Perhaps, though, more scrutiny should fall on their opponents. City have been pretty average this year, but looking through their squad it's not hard to see why. We're a few years deep into the "project" now, and the only world-class players City have were bought seasons ago. Since then, they've added Fernando, Martin Demichelis, a bald goalkeeper called Willy and the Spanish Stewart Downing.

Where's the ambition gone?

pic.twitter.com/oV6MnMqzfI

— Craig G Telfer (@CraigGTelfer) November 22, 2014

Will Arsenal Grow Some Genitals?
​Arsenal's defeat to United last week may have looked like the whole club in microcosm, but the same is true of Jack Wilshere. Glide past the opposition midfield at will with pretty football, fluff the one chance you get, pick an ill-advised fight, then get your ankle shattered on live TV. This is what the man now lives for.

Of course, many people will feel he got what he deserved. There are many reasons to hate the man – from the tub-thumping patriot poetry, the clothes, the sofa, and the swear-im-gonna-knock-him-out waiting-for-the-bouncers-to-arrive aggro.

They might seem to be two of the most different players imaginable, but Wilshere has something in common with Theo Walcott. It already seems that the former's doomed to the Peter Pan syndrome that afflicted the latter and the likes of Adam Johnson, doomed to still be referred to as a "youngster" when pushing 27.

He almost seems like he was grown in an FA lab, the second experiment after Walcott failed to capture the nation's imagination. This time they went to Stevenage, the real soul of England, but their creation was doomed to never be able to grow up or reproduce. Maybe he doesn't even have any genitals at all. It would certainly explain a lot.
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Will Any Hard-men Step Up?
​This week in France brought pretty terrible news for hard-men around football, as Brandao ended up with a month in la grande maison for headbutting Thiago Motta in the tunnel a few weeks back.

The footage is available for all to see, and it's a weird one. Who headbutts someone and then runs away? It's usually the mark of a confident man, to be prepared to put his head where another man's mouth is, but Brandao immediately legs it as if he's just issued a nipple-cripple or pulled his shorts down.

Maybe we've taken a step closer to the day ex-pros have constantly warned us about, where you'll get sued for fouling someone and tackling and heading will be banned. If the biggest moment in the hardman calendar is coming from a Brazilian journeyman striker in the French league, it's already clear those glory days are behind us.

It's Time to Flip the Fit and Proper Persons Test Upside Down
​If you're not exactly sure what happened to Rangers a few years ago, you're not alone. It's a fantastically complicated situation of fraud, massive debts that didn't exist, tax avoidance, tax evasion, criminals and arseholes. Now Mexican prisons can get added to that list, as the man who ultimately caused it was arrested in Mexico and is awaiting extradition to the UK.

We can look at Vincent Tan, Venky's, Massimo Cellino and that weirdo at Blackpool, but if even the local-boy-done-good type of chairman ends up with his purchase of the club resulting in him doing time in a Mexican prison as an international fugitive, what hope do we have?

After all, in the real disasters with football clubs, the common theme has been that the guys involved were too small-time. We need a new fit and proper persons test, from the opposite point of view. You must have a criminal record and be using the club to prop up at least one flagging business empire, dictatorship or oil state. These days, it's the only model that really seems to work.

​@Callum_TH

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