Being manager of Liverpool FC may well be an impossible job.
Nowhere else is there such a disparity between aspiration and expectations and an institutional inability to achieve the dreams planted in us by our historical achievement.
That institutional inability is both material -- in terms of our inability to compete economically with the clubs ahead of us -- and in one sense a lack of institutional intelligence, making the wrong decisions, that have crippled us for the last quarter of a century as we have basically been in a cycle of relative decline.
So the plan is that the material, institutional disadvantage gets reduced through growing commercial streams and we are making progress on that, and maybe in five or ten years (who knows when) we'll be in a position to stand eye to eye with our rivals and offer wages to players to make us a team capable of recapturing past glory.
In the meantime, the disparity persists, and the expectation between what we feel, in our bones, our heart and soul about where we should be, and our ability to achievement, a structural inability compounded by bad decisions, makes the seat of Liverpool manager almost impossible to have success.
Brendan almost achieved what would have been the most important and incredible trophy in our history given all circumstances and contexts. And yet here we are now, on the brink of wanting him away from us.
There are many reasons to be sympathetic to Brendan, there are many reasons to give him leeway and understanding, to say that he was impeded. And he was. And he was in the impossible job. And we didn't have the institutional ability to bridge the loss of Suarez, and bad luck put Sturridge out, and we didn't make relevant contingency plans, and we spent money on sub-par signings instead of difference-makers.
So yes, Brendan is not to blame entirely. But that doesn't mean its right for him to continue. There are too many accumulations of failure through this season that went beyond simple errors of judgment, they were failures that went deep and left us lifeless, listless and were unforgiveable. From the European campaign to the final sequence of the season post United. They went into the realm of humiliation and deep paralysis. And that doesn't mean we have to accept our limitations. Especially if there are managers with achievements and who have an edge, by means of insight, and savvy, that can give us the breaks we need to help us in this period in which we play catch up institutionally with those above us. For the sake of an emotional charge, I feel we need change.
Structural mediocrity, that is, a mediocrity that is near impossible to get out of, is a real danger now. Especially after the insipidity of our results. The job will remain a chalice of difficulty, because of that disparity of expectation and material disadvantage, but we have to try to improve, and change those margins as we crawl back financially and in the seat of the manager there can be improvement at present. That is one change that can be made. Not for the sake of it. But because a change would be for the better, provided we can get someone like Klopp or Ancelloti in. Because Liverpool FC should not be club where a manager trains on the job, or uses it as an arc for personal development, to learn how to play in Europe and so on. Liverpool FC should be the place where already established, great managers find their place on the managers seat. And if not available, well, that's a different question, and changes the game. So FSG are wise to play their cards close if they are contemplating change. We are subject to the circumstances we find ourselves in. But the aspiration to better is there, and even though we may despair our inability to achieve, that aspiration to improvement should fairly apply to the institution of who our manager is too, when a season like this one has ended.
