I dearly want Purslow out, but I'm scared rigid of the next prospective gap-filler.
Someone needs to get a grip of this club right now, and I think that understandably it cannot be NESV that do that, they need a bit of time to understand the whole thing before wading in with both feet.
This is exactly what Kenny should be doing, but then again, Kenny also said it was 'time for Rafa to go'...which infuriates me still, because back in October last year Kenny came out and said that the only reason he returned to the club in any role was because Rafa wanted him there.
And not forgetting that Rafa backed Kenny to be our next manager in an interview on the 16th June, once he was in place at Inter.
'I think they should look at Kenny Dalglish. He is the best man for the job. The owners should listen to the fans because they are unhappy.
'No one knows the club better than Dalglish, and he would be perfect there. He wants the job and in my opinion he should get it.'
So it makes it doubly hard to read and understand when Dalglish said the following in his recent book...
It was right for everybody that Rafa Benitez left - for him and for Liverpool Football Club. There just comes a stage in every manager's career when the board says, "You've been good for the club but we feel it would be best if you go."
Sometimes it works the same way for a manager - "I've done my time. There's no animosity but it's time to have a go somewhere else."
When it was clear Rafa was going, managing director Christian Purslow asked me to get involved in the selection process for the next manager. They drew up a list, asked me to come and meet the candidates and then let them decide who the manager should be.
In mid-June, I had to let them know my real views. I wanted the job. I couldn't miss the opportunity.
One day I was in a meeting with Christian and the chairman, Martin Broughton, and formally put my name forward. "We don't want you, Kenny," came the reply from Christian and the chairman. Fine. That's their prerogative. They explained they had different plans for me, a position with greater longevity.
"We want you for a role at the club that would be for longer than the tenure of the manager," the board told me. The job focused on player development.
It wasn't management, though.
It's a really odd situation isn't it. And Rafa being Rafa, the print journalism can sometimes miss his sarcasm, which could very well be the way he meant his comments. Did Rafa really want Kenny around?
Purslow wants to be seen asking Kenny for his views, but at no time has he ever actually done what Kenny suggested it would seem.
Kenny is basically asked if Hodgson should be manager, but instead he proposes himself as the best possible option on the table. Kenny isn't that kind of self-absorbed man, putting himself forward was a last resort, and it was batted out of the park by Purslow.
His long-term role doesn't even seem to extend to managerial appointments, instead he is asked to look over 'player development', whatever the fuck that means in the chinese takeaway world of football transfers, why are we developing players above and beyond what Borrell already does so well?
It's a nonsense position he has been given, utter nonsense, he's being kept in the corner.
Sorry it's a garbled post, but I've confused myself thinking about the different ways to interpret their relationship, and how it relates to Purslow. But I think Rafa's comments about Purslow 'changing things' also relate to the hiring of Kenny, who wouldn't see that as a direct threat to them?
