20

HEAVEN ELEVEN

To complete the religious theme, the flag had a liver bird with a halo around its head, too! And I very nearly had a miraculous impact on the game. We were drawing 1–1 with less than ten minutes remaining when a long throw came in from the Kemlyn Road side of the ground. It bounced up and, with my back to goal, I volleyed a perfect bicycle kick high into the roof of the net. Oh, my word! The roar from The Kop was off the scale – everyone was going mad with joy that the returning Son had delivered the perfect postscript.

Yet it was not to be. The moment I turned to run towards the crowd in celebration, the first thing I saw was the linesman, his back ramrod straight, flag in the air, staring upwards and over the players’ heads in that ‘I am correct and my decision is absolute!’ way that they have. I was gutted – absolutely sick. It was a bit of a downer, too, that I was cup-tied that season. Just the week before the Man City v United farewell game, I scored an FA Cup hat-trick against a tenacious Scunthorpe side. That ruled me out of what turned out to be a glorious campaign for Liverpool, culminating in another tense but ultimately victorious final against West Ham.

I’ll never forget the date – 15th March 2006 – or the relief when the first goal of my second coming finally came. And guess what? It was against Fulham – again – in another five-goal win for the Reds. Harry Kewell sent a wicked, bendy corner across, Fernando Morientes headed it on and, somehow – because the ball had already gone beyond me and, by rights, I shouldn’t have been able to get any kind of purchase on it – I strained every sinew in my neck and managed to head it back beyond Mark Crossley and into the opposite corner.

What a moment!

This time there was no doubting the goal would stand and the entire team mobbed me. I was trying to shrug them off so I could run around the entire four sides of the ground, but Stevie Gerrard had other ideas, hauling me down, WWF-style and leading the pile-on. It was fabulous! I went on to score five in the final six games of the season, resulting in high praise – and a new, one-year contract – from Rafa.

‘We are delighted that Robbie has agreed to sign for another year,’ said Rafa. As if I was going to think twice! ‘He has done really well and thoroughly deserves this.’

As end-of-term reports go, it was music to my ears. My second goal in that run took me above the great Kenny Dalglish in the ranks of all-time Liverpool goal-scorers. To complete my renaissance, Djibril left the club and I was able to go into the 2006–07 season as Liverpool’s Number 9 – I was home!

As it turned out, Rafa brought in Dirk Kuyt and Craig Bellamy that season to play alongside Crouchy as his first-choice strike duo. We also added Daniel Agger, Momo Sissoko and Jan Kromkamp. There was a story – never verified, needless to say – that Everton were scouting Danny Agger for an entire season.

‘Get us that elegant, ball-playing Danish centre-back,’ said David Moyes. ‘He’s mustard!’

So, a deal was done, though it took Moyes a few games to realise he’d been given Per Kroldrup instead of Agger! Whatever the truth, it’s fair to think that Liverpool got the better player.

We started the 2006–07 season at Bramall Lane and I started the season with a goal. It was a stiflingly hot day and, in all truth, neither side was particularly fluent. With an hour gone and his team a goal up, Neil Warnock seemed happy to shut up shop. They parked the bus and we were running out of ideas when Stevie Gerrard ran onto a pass, swerved a tackle and accelerated into the Sheffield United box. Both their keeper and central defender converged to close Stevie down. Morgan was about to lunge in for a tackle then seemed to change his mind and pull out. Stevie went down and the referee pointed to the spot.

In a press conference after the game, the ref said, while he realised that little or no contact had been made, it was within the letter of the law to award a penalty for ‘intent’, if the match officials believed a player meant to impede an opponent. A grey area, but one from which we were very happy to benefit! I have to say I stroked the pen home with great nonchalance and, fume as Neil Warnock might – and, boy, did he fume! – we were going home with a point we didn’t look like we were going to get for much of the game.

Oddly, and for me, disappointingly, penalties against Sheffield United were the only goals I scored for Liverpool in that second season – three of them. There can be no way of knowing at the time, but my last goals for Liverpool came on 24th February, 2007. In a strange first half, we got two penalties at the Kop end in the opening 25 minutes. I took them both and scored them both – there was never a doubt in my mind. The second one, though … I don’t know. I’m not saying I knew that this would turn out to be my last ever as a Liverpool player, but there was something eerie about it. I’m always very certain with my spot kicks – I make my mind up, take three or four steps back and whack it in. This one against the Blades, I took a longer run-up, then hesitated for a split second – which is something I never do. Was I making the moment last just a little bit longer? I honestly don’t know. Paddy Kenny guessed the right way – I hit it low, to his left – but it was a nice one, right into the side netting so he had no chance. If there had been some magical way of knowing that that would be my last, I would have taken the inevitable booking and jumped into The Kop whirling my shirt above my head. We won the game 4–0.

But I was on top of the world, back where I wanted to be, playing for Liverpool in a team which was going places. And, to compound my new-found happiness, Kerrie gave birth to our fourth child – a boy, Jacob, born in May that year. I was besotted with my little tribe of girls, but the arrival of a son completed my family bliss. It would be a while until he could kick a football, but I was already marking out a little pitch in the back garden, ready to set the miniature goals up. Madison, Jaya and Mackenzie were my absolute pride and joy, though none of them showed even a token interest in the footy. Whether Jacob liked it or not, I had his card marked, right from birth. He was going to be my football buddy from that day forward!

Although Jacob and I have already created many a fantastic memory together – not least our trips to Spain to see Liverpool play Barcelona, that wonderful night in Madrid in June 2018 – he was too young to see his dad’s last couple of games in a Liverpool shirt. On 1st May 2007 we found ourselves, once again, up against José Mourinho’s Chelsea side in the return leg of the semi-final of the Champions League. They had won the first leg at Stamford Bridge 1–0, courtesy of a Joe Cole strike.

While it would have taken something very, very special to rival the atmosphere of the 2005 semi-final – which I’d gone to watch with Macca – there was still a spine-tingling sense of destiny as The Kop drowned out the UEFA anthem with ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’ as the two teams were led out. I’ve asked myself many, many times over the years what it is about Anfield that is so unbelievably special, especially on nights like this.

Many people will automatically assume I’m biased, that I’m just blowing smoke up the Liverpool fans’ arses, but let’s not forget that I started out life as a Blue. I’m a romantic – all footballers are – but I’m not delusional and when I say the Anfield crowd is unlike any other set of supporters anywhere else in the world, I’m saying so with a degree of perspective. Pep Guardiola recently came out and said the same thing – Anfield generates its own magical power, and it’s very hard to combat. I’ve thought about it time and again, even when I’m just watching the game on the telly, and I’ve come to believe that a huge part of the witchcraft is the anthem itself: ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’. Symbolically, and in terms of the message it sends and the spectacle it provides, it is the ultimate, perfect statement of intent about what the club stands for and what it is. As the teams came out for the Champions League semi in 2007, you could sense there was something in the air. José Mourinho seemed to feel it, too. I caught him staring at The Kop – if not in awe then in admiration – and there was a sense that he was thinking how much he’d love to work for fans like these in an atmosphere like this.

I was on the bench, but obviously dreaming of coming on at some point and, hopefully, making a difference. In a well-worked routine from a Stevie G free-kick, Danny Agger struck a beautiful left-footed equaliser after 20 minutes. Game on! If the atmosphere hadn’t been quite up to the mega decibels of 2005, then it was now. The entire stadium was shaking as the crowd sang ‘We Shall Not Be Moved’! After Dirk Kuyt rattled the crossbar with a bullet header, there weren’t too many cut-and-dried chances and as the game staggered through extra time towards a penalty shootout, Rafa Benítez brought me on. Was this to be my swansong? Was I, finally, going to notch the penalty that sent the crowd into raptures and sent my team to another final?

I immediately held my hand up to take our fifth penalty – hoping, hoping, hoping that things would go that far. The penalties were taken at the Anfield Road End, where the Chelsea fans were gathered, but there was still a brain-melting level of hissing, booing and whistling from the Anfield crowd as their players took their pens. I knew Arjen Robben was going to miss his from the moment he placed the ball. All the ‘tells’ were there – licking his lips, glancing at the ref in a way that seemed to say: ‘Let’s get this over and done with!’

The Kop got right inside the Chelsea players’ heads and we went into a 3–1 lead. Their combative little Cameroonian midfielder Geremi stepped up to take Chelsea’s third pen. If he scored, it would be down to Dirk Kuyt, then me … But Geremi hit his penalty tamely and Pepe Reina saved. Now it was down to Dirk, not just to keep the shootout alive, but to win it for us. There is a bit of footage out there in YouTube land of all the Liverpool players in the centre circle, watching the penalties. If you were to focus solely on my face and my reaction, you might be forgiven for thinking we’d lost. What was going through my mind was all the memories flooding back – it only seemed like yesterday that I was scoring in front of The Kop on my Anfield debut. The four-and-a-half-minute hat-trick against Arsenal. The double against Everton – snorting the touchline. My 100th goal, in record time. In the blink of an eye, 14 years had flown by and I was standing here with a new set of teammates, willing us into another huge European final, yet wanting to deliver the magic moment, courtesy of my own trusty left boot.

Anyone looking at that YouTube footage will see a very brief look of resignation on my face as Dirk Kuyt slams the winning penalty home and Anfield goes berserk. Steven Gerrard seems to give me a little hug of consolation. Seconds later, I’m racing after Dirk with everyone else, celebrating another triumph over José’s men, but for that split second, I truly hoped it would have been me rather than him that won the game for us.

My huge and lasting regret about my first spell at Liverpool was that I never got a chance to say a proper farewell to the crowd in what turned out to be my final game, when I was subbed at half-time against Sunderland. By the time we played Charlton in the last game of the 2006–07 season, I knew that my contract wasn’t going to be renewed – and I was pretty certain I wouldn’t be featuring in the Champions League final in Athens, either. This time, though, I had the honour of leading the team out as captain for the day and staying on the pitch almost until the last kick. On 88 minutes, Rafa took me off and led the standing ovation as the entire ground – Charlton supporters, too – rose to their feet to clap me off. Was that a fleck of dust in my eye? I was bawling my heart out! And, in one of those bittersweet moments that tend to happen in football, just after I’d come off, Charlton gave away a penalty! Harry Kewell made a comical bid to the ref to let me come back on again, but rules is rules – even for God. Harry slotted the pen, we drew 2–2 and that was my long goodbye to Anfield, over and out.