[Xgenre]

Chelsea has a brilliant scouting team. By putting out rumours that they will bid $50 million pounds for Torres, they give the impression that they are hunting for only the best players. Players that they are actually bidding for will wonder if they may really end up playing with Stars like torres. It gives an impression that they will be joining a team that will acheive trophies. Chelsea doesn't even need to submit a formal bid to us to create this impression and it will not cost that a single penny to create 'rumours'.

Rafa, on the other hand, talks abt needing to spend more money to catch the Big 2. There are even reports that he is dismissing our title hopes for next season unless we spend big. If you are a player talking to liverpool now, your impression will be that you are going to join a team that is just an also-run. A team that is far less likely to win trophies than Chelsea. If given a choice between Chelsea and Liverpool, with the type of news coming out now, who will you join?

The 2nd point of Rafa coming out to say we need to spend big to catch up is that CLUBS will ask for more money from us! You say you want to spend big what, so I sell you at a more expensive price lor! Not a smart thing to say in business. Will any of you go tell a property agent that you will want to buy an expensive house? If you do so, your agent will just tell the seller to ask for more cash above valuation right? Not very smart.

Rafa doesn't seem to know how to play the players he buys. Torres was an exception. I think a lot of us rate Crouch as our 2nd best striker (after Torres), yet he didn't start the world championship final, our 2nd Champions League final and only started 9 league games last season. Whenever Crouch plays, he looks pretty sharp, especially his long range shots. Kuyt on the other hand...

I do hope we will try to buy Joaquim, Bentley, Alves but I know we will settle for some unknown player who plays for some unknown teams. Just gotten the new jersey for next season, it looks great!