=I wouldn't be too surprised to see Torres and Reina leave in the January transfer window.

Reina's always welcome at the Emirates:lol:

Reina's always welcome at the Emirates:lol:

Roy's nightmare not over yet
Published by Early Doors Mon Oct 04 08:49AM

Early Doors, like almost everyone else, likes Roy Hodgson. How could you not?

His calm, avuncular demeanour is a soothing presence in a Premier League managers' union populated by tantrum-throwing, gum-chewing Scots, paranoid Gallic conspiracy theorists and crafty schemers with delusions of grandeur.

So hopes were high that Uncle Woy would bring a degree of order and sanity with him from west London to Anfield when he made the move north this summer.

However, with Liverpool's 2-1 home defeat at the hands of Blackpool - whose earlier trips to Arsenal and Chelsea saw them ship 10 goals without reply - even Hodgson's sturdy psychological defences, built up over 35 years of management amassing a CV broader than Stephen Fry's, have taken a hefty knock.

After his gamble in playing Fernando Torres backfired after just 10 minutes, the rest of his 'players' contriving to put in an insipid 'performance' and his home fans so utterly resigned to their club's demise that many applauded their tangerine vanquishers off the pitch, Hodgson looked and sounded like a broken man.

"Their great result is our nightmare result," he said. "It is a very bad day and there is nothing I can say.

"At the moment things look bleak and really bad and it is difficult for me to put a bright face upon it. There are 31 games left but when you are in the relegation zone you are in a relegation battle."

Indeed they are in the relegation zone, going into the international break in the bottom three for the first time in 46 years. The last time they won just one of their opening seven league matches, in 1953, they went down.

It was all very well falling back on the fact that at least they got meetings with Arsenal and Manchester United out of the way early, but that means little if you lose to Blackpool and Northampton in your own back yard.

And, with an international break fraught with injury peril for his players to negotiate before they travel to Goodison Park - two days after the debt payment deadline that could well see the club taken over by RBS, no less - Roy may not be waking up from his nightmare for a while yet.

Hodgson's success at Fulham which landed him the Liverpool job was built upon drilling a strong, committed nucleus of players into a system that made them hard to beat, but that takes time to set in. Just look at how the Cottagers clicked into gear at the end of Hodgson's first season there, when they avoided relegation on the final day.

This season has long since been written off as a restructuring exercise, theoretically giving Hodgson the time and space he needs to build a new era at the club freed from the restraints of over-ambition that will remain unfulfilled under the ownership of Tom Hicks and George Gillett.

ED fears, however, that he won't be given that time. Whoever eventually takes over at the club may want to bring in their own man, and the less they know about the game, the more precarious Hodgson's position. They way things are going at the moment, RBS may even exchange him for shamed former chief executive Fred 'the Shred' Goodwin.

Liverpool fans should keep their fingers crossed that Liverpool's eventual new owners will rightly see Hodgson as a key component in the club's revival, rather than a reason for its demise.

GET ON IT HODGSON!

http://soccernet.espn.go.com/news/story?id=830147&sec=transfers&campaign=rss&source=soccernet&cc=3436

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i'm sure you'd be creaming your pants at the sight of that strike force david...

forlan and torres :p am i right in saying it only lacks suarez? :p

thanks for the guardian tip imno... really good stuff

I've been trolling the LFC boards and all the related articles all week so if you have any questions about it, I may well have an answer for you.

11.38am: Hicks and Gillett representative admits to breach of contract but feels there is no urge for board to be reconstituted before Friday.

RBS dismisses this as 'absurd' given the company needs to repay £200m to the bank by Friday.

THIS IS JUST ABSURD... DOES HICKS WANT TO SEND THE CLUB INTO ADMINISTRATION