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A Question or Two for Martin Broughton

So this is the new Liverpool Way where the fans get to know what the club’s chairman thinks about the future of a player through comments he made at a rival club’s end of season do.

In reality, there isn’t really anything particularly revealing in Martin Broughton’s reported comments that he thinks that Fernando Torres is at the stage in his career where he had to think about his future before deciding whether to stay at Anfield or not.  If we’re being honest, it is something that we have all thought ourselves. Indeed it was more interesting to read that he thinks that it will take three years to turn the club around.  Given the pessimistic reports coming out of the club over the past couple of weeks, it is perhaps a better outlook than most have dared hope for.

Yet that does not mean that the whole story does not raise any questions.  The first and most obvious one centres around what he was doing at Chelsea’s Player of the Year award in the first place.  For someone who felt the need to publicly claim that he wasn’t going to attend the Liverpool v Chelsea game because he didn’t think that it was fair on both himself and the club, it was quite a strange and questionable decision to say the least.

For all the lack of class that he showed in making that decision, the fan inside of us can understand his desire to be there.  Much less excusable is the fact that he decided to share his opinions with someone who was at the same event.  This is a man who publicly said that he didn’t feel that it was appropriate for him to meet the Spirit of Shankly or any other supporter group because it wasn’t right to address one particular group privately.  Yet apparently it seems that he feels it is right to address one individual at a party.  And isn’t expressing an opinion like that at an official event of a rival club – one that has publicly expressed an interest in Torres – tantamount to revealing insider information?

It certainly isn’t beyond imagination that Chelsea, on hearing those comments, might get in touch with Torres’ agent to put pressure on the player to move.  Not to mention signalling to them that they can put in a lower offer than they might have thought because the decision about the player’s future is out of Liverpool’s hands.  Either way, it certainly isn’t going to help Liverpool.

When Broughton was appointed as chairman, the doubts over having in that role someone who was a fan of such a close rival like Chelsea were shouted down by claims that a professional like him wouldn’t let personal allegiances come in the way of doing a good job.  Sadly, his actions so far have shown that the faith of those who defended his appointment was misplaced.

Editor ~ Paul submitted this excellent piece last Monday (31/5/10), some 3 days prior to Rafa Benitez’s departure from Liverpool Football Club. We decided deliberately to delay publishing, in order that its impact would not be minimised – it does show great foresight on his part