Sunday World columnist Roy Curtis has today launched another stinging criticism of probably his favourite target, Steven Gerrard. Back in May, he rose the hackles of Liverpool fans with his charge that Gerrard is "the most self-obsessed footballer of his generation", while today his accusation is that the Reds' skipper is "the leading man in a one-man show of delusion and denial."
Central to this accusation was Gerrard's recent comment on how he felt that Liverpool would have been favourites to win the league this year if Suárez had stayed at Anfield, an act that Curtis believes is Gerrard perhaps "getting his excuses in early" before the new season begins.
"Leave aside for a moment that his little nugget of Scouse philosophy qualified for the 'If My Aunty Had You-Know-Whats She'd Be My Uncle' award," he said.
"Like many of Stevie G's more outrageous passes, it was speculative, spectacular and, truth be told, so loose that it was hard to identify exactly for whom it was meant.
"First a statement of the obvious that undermines the argument: Liverpool had Suárez last year and didn't win the league".
None of this is new or all that surprising from wind-up merchant Curtis, but what has caused a particularly sour reaction on social media today was his use of the term "always the victim" in relation to Gerrard's comments.
Said Curtis:
"But the beauty of Gerrard's latest PR stunt is twofold: A: it cannot be disproved. B: It allows Stevie to play his favourite role... Always the victim."
He continued: "Liverpool have already spent £100m this summer, yet here is their captain putting on the poor mouth."
The phrase "Always the victim" is of course better known in the context of a well-known anti-Liverpool crowd chant. It has caused plenty of outrage among Liverpool fans today, but Curtis will likely defend his choice of words in the context of his argument, and the fact that neither Hillsbrough nor Heysel were mentioned in the article.
Controversial word choices aside, he went on to ridicule Brendan Rodgers' pronouncement that Latin American players see going to Spain as a "pathway back to their own country", which he said was Rodgers attempting to hide "an unpalatable truth: Suárez left Liverpool because he wanted to join a serious football club".
He concluded by saying that the entire Premier League is "deeply in crisis" with "none of the world's best players" on show there, allowing Gerrard's "outrageous" pronouncement to appear "presidential" in the midst of the mediocrity.
What do you think?
