The Premier League 2008/09 - An Obituary pt1.

So there it is then. After being forced the agony of watching both my beloved sides lose the F.A Cup Final in consecutive years the season is finally over, and for a brief time at least the Saturday evening sinking feeling that goes with it. You cant say it wasn’t exciting what with Stoke abolishing football from the Premiership, Phil Brown proving that footballers are indeed not made of the same stern and proud granite they once were, and Newcastle United finally granting the wish of millions of neutral football fans across the United Kingdom by relegating themselves as a result of once again choosing cult status over actual football management ability in their hunt for a scapego…sorry messiah…manger, shit sorry. Perhaps the two most shocking revelations of the season though were Everton claiming their inevitable fifth spot despite the use of any fit strikers and Rafael Benitez finally demonstrating that he is a capable manager after all, a fact that he has hidden quite magnificently over the past few years.

We begin our misty-eyed look back, appropriately, with the top two...

Manchester United – It wasn’t always pretty, and in the end wasn’t wholly convincing either. They proved their worth by hauling themselves over both early and late season wobbles to cross the line still valiantly fending off those desperately snapping at their tails.

Star Man: Nemanja Vidic had a colossal first half of the season where he was seemingly peerless at the heart of the United defence. The second half was far less impressive and that sending off at home to Liverpool was just the tip of a decidedly shaky iceberg that showed him horribly susceptible to pace, a flaw that could also have seen him dismissed on several other occasions, not least the moment at St James’ Park where he kicked Obafemi Martins up into the Newcastle night’s sky. Micahel Carrick’s season followed a similar trajectory to that of his Serbian team-mate – sublime for the most part but tailed off terribly towards the end where he descended from being the puppet-master of the whole scary operation into little more than confused bystander culminating in last Wednesday’s sojourn to Rome. Therefore our vote goes to John O’Shea who has quite amazingly made fifty-five appearances this season for United. Of course much of this is down to the fact that both Gary Neville and Wes Brown missed large chunks of the season themselves, yet regardless O’Shea has proved himself time and again an essential cog in the trophy machine that is Ferguson’s United. While the tools to be a top-level performer at anyone position may be questioned, his versatility and desire simply cannot.

Surprise Package: The two hugely important goals netted by Federico Macheda at home to Aston Villa and away at Sunderland should not be ignored and neither should the rejuvenated form of one-time flying winger turned hamstrung cultured midfield maestro Ryan Giggs but, it’s the form of Darren Fletcher that has really stood out for the champions this season. There was a time when Fletcher was considered at best a bit-part player by United fans, at worst he was the undeserved point of scorn for United fans venting at puzzled team-selections. So quite how he has become un-droppable in the centre of an unmistakably expensive United midfield fly’s over our comprehension also. The simple fact is he has.

‘Oh Dear’: Quite how a team as good as United can have so many frustrating average players in their ranks is a mystery. At the moment the combined £30million shelled out on Nani and Anderson seems as dodgy as any of Alex Ferguson’s fairly long list of transfer busts. The problem is that Nani for all the fleeting upside and similarities to a young-er Christiano Ronaldo, he simply isn’t good enough at the stupidly high level of the Premier League. As for Anderson, while he is seemingly in-line to take over Fletcher’s mantle of frustratingly ever-present to deservedly ever-present somewhere down the line, at the moment it doesn’t look likely. That leaves just one surly Bulgarian wizard to discuss then. There’s no denying the talent of Demitar Berbatov there is however, good reason to question his attitude and just where he fits into United’s game-plan. Like the unmitigated disaster that was Juan Seba Veron before him, his relaxed style simply doesn’t suit his surroundings at Old Trafford, worse still it negates everything that’s deadly about United’s break-neck counter-attacking style. Worse still is that ten domestic goals simply isn’t enough return from an investment of £30million plus.


Liverpool – Finally proved themselves both worthy and capable of an extended title push after years of bitter disappointment. At times looked likely to push the eventual champions even further and, but for key injuries to key players at key times in the season, they might well have done so.

Star Man: While many pundits are rightly applauding the efforts of Xabi Alonso in the middle of the Anfield park it’s difficult to over-look the exploits of Steven Gerrard. While the Spaniard’s performances are further amplified by Benitez’s well publicised desire to move him on from Liverpool last summer the drive and mental toughness that Gerrard supplies his club with is both unrivalled in world football and quite simply irreplaceable. There’s no denying that Liverpool are a better team when Alonso is in it, both in terms of ability and to watch as neutral however it’s stone-cold fact that Liverpool are a shoadow of their usual selves when Gerrard doesn’t play. A total of twenty-five goals in all competitions should be unfathomable for a midfielder, for Gerrard it merely levelled his career best haul from two years ago.

Surprise Package: Regardless of how much it seems like it Dirk Kuyt’s sixteen goals this seasons isn’t that much of an increase from his previous two years at Liverpool where he managed twelve and fourteen in all competitions respectively, it’s been the nature of the play that’s signalled the boost in performance. For the first time since hi arrival in England there was a consistent end product to all his much-praised work-rate, not only have there been goals but there has been continual supply from the left-flank – he has looked dangerous. For the first time I am forced to admit that Dirk Kuyt looks worthy of being called a Premier League player and anyone who knows me will know exactly how much that will have hurt to type. Even so, even the golden fleeced one’s performances have been diminished by another of Liverpool’s previously maligned, un-productive wide-men. Yossi Benayoun is the reason that the title race went on as long as it did this season. His goals directly rescued five points for Liverpool in the second-half of this season while a further three set them on the win to important wins. Without his back-to-back strikes against Sunderland and Fulham, United may have been champions by early April, without his double in the eight-goal thriller against Arsenal it almost certainly would have been over that night. That’s also without mentioning the winner away at The Bernabeau which tossed Real Madrid from the Champions League.

‘Oh Dear’: Would it be too easy to pin-point Robbie Keane here? True - it seems that he was brought to Anfield under false pretences. True – It can be argued that he wasn’t given a fair chance with Benitez preferring to pair Torres with Gerrard in an advanced role. True also – He looked bloody awful when he did play. The same goes for Andrea Dossena who despite being Italy’s first choice left-back (seriously!?) and costing a mystifying £7million from Udinese, still looks more like a rugby hooker that a football player, and at times plays more like one too. His first touch is so horrendous I’m still certain he was merely trying to bring the ball down when he lobbed Edwin Van der Saar at Old Trafford back in March. Amazingly there is someone that was even less impressive in a Liverpool shirt this season – hands up Phillipp Degen. Admittedly it’s pretty difficult to impress with only two League Cup appearances under your belt and yes he did struggle with injuries but, for a player who has been capped thirty times for his native Switzerland, looked extremely competent during his three-year stint at Broussia Dortmund, and is a full-back, a position where Liverpool have zero strength in depth anyway…what exactly went wrong?