Merseyside Mediocrity – The reality of past dominance

Rewind the footballing landscape around thirty years and you will find the two Merseyside teams battling it out like a couple of heavyweight boxers in a multi million pound title fight. Throughout the eighties, Everton and Liverpool won between them, two FA Cups (two of them facing each other), six league cups, one European Cup winners Cup, two European Cups and a staggering eight out of ten league titles.

Dominance is a word used too frequently and certainly too cheaply in our hyped up media. But from the most avid supporter to the fiercest critic, you would be hard pressed to not use such a word to explain that period of time.

To most younger fans of the game, dominance is something Manchester United have achieved under Sir Alex Ferguson or what Chelsea are threatening to do under Ancelotti, unless Mancini or Wenger have their way. It’s this sentence and many discussions like it that stick in the throat of Scousers like a violent furball.

Everton have long since slipped from their place at the pinnacle of English football.  Before the Premier league came to being, Everton had collapsed like a ‘well paid’  Pakistan batting display.

From the heady heights of winning the league in 1987, Everton haven’t so much as  flirted with relegation but had a sordid affair with it, their last day escapes in 1994 and  1998 exemplify this perfectly and whilst life under David Moyes has seen them challenging in the better end of the table, you could be forgiven for thinking that they look like the small fish who can’t afford to swim in the big expensive pond.

Liverpool haven’t had the same story. They continued to win honours in the 90’s and under Gerard Houlier and of course, Rafa Benitez, they have found great success in European competition, including of course the incredible Champions league victory in 2005.

But whilst their slip has been less brutal than their neighbours across Stanley Park, the signs of the times are that Liverpool may well be clinging to their big team status by the skin of Fernando Torres teeth (and maybe a few of Gerrard’s fingers!)

Benitez has gone, the echo of Istanbul in 2005 becoming ever so distant, and the question of how long a well respected, well experienced and yet ‘he’s no Mourinho’ manager in Roy Hodgson can keep up the facade that Liverpool can still expect to be challenging for honours with Chelsea, Man Utd, Arsenal or dare I say it, Man City?

I am not a fan of Liverpool but I do like the club and have a secondary soft spot for any team that has given me the kind of enjoyment Liverpool have as neutral watching them over the years. But watching the results of the Carling Cup come in this week and seeing Liverpool falling to Northampton, there was a sense of non surprise about it.

Even when the Reds then drew with Sunderland at home, a team albeit that are performing like Steve Bruce may well be threatening to give them all nose jobs like his, is there not a sense that this more the kind of result to be expecting from the once mighty men of Anfield? That a win is hoped for, thought about, looked to but not expected. Certainly not like the big teams expect to win.

Supporting a big team seems to mean assuming that three points will be yours. Chelsea fans must await the visit of Bolton, Sunderland or West Ham and be checking what the table will look like following another three points. Maybe its arrogant, or maybe its likely and therefore fair?

Everton fans are hoping to win, looking to win, thinking about the possibility of the win but expecting the win? Not since the 80’s.

Liverpool fans? The ones I know are changing, coming to terms with a different reality. A reality that relies heavily on one or two players finding and maintaining form. A reality that means they are nervous that points will be dropped, that games could be lost, that their team could be slipping towards their blue neighbours. Where footballing success is celebrated with the same passion but not expected with the same presuming comfort.