The Day I Finally Understood the Fuss about Momo Sissoko

I'm often wrong.

I thought Jamie Carragher would be at most a dependable big-hearted player who would never learn to pass. I thought we should have resigned Michael Owen when he became available. I thought Jean Arne Riise wasn't the right man for left-full. I thought goalkeepers should almost never punch the ball. I thought Stephen Gerrard was not a leader but a child. And I thought Momo Sissoko was lacking one vital area of his trade.

Jamie Carragher moved in from the wings and took on a central role, literally and figuratively, becoming in the process the undisputed hero of Merseyside and probably the best defender in the country.

Michael Owen transferred, perhaps fittingly, to Souness's Newcastle and has spent most of the season, as Pat predicted, not even on the bench, while Sven Goran Erikkson's idiocy, naivety and greed when faced with the hounds of the British tabloid press has exposed the true hometown of Owen's ambitions, a place, for better or for worse, far south from those sacred bastions of traditional northern football pride, Anfield in the east and St. James's Park in the west.

As Rafa Benitez finally saw the strobelight of why Djimi Traore should never ever be in a Liverpool starting lineup, and Stephen Warnock started to show that his lionhearted prowess in the tackle and gameness in getting forward is matched only by his utterly hopeless, "who's been messing around with the magnets", positional sense and total inability to read the game, Jean Arne Riise's returns to the left-back position started to coincide with clean sheets, unbeaten games and records being broken.

Somewhere along the course of this season the sight of the diminutive Jose Reina well off his line, one arm extended in a crowd bodies, stopped giving me the jitters.

Then Stephen Gerrard started to match his massively improved performances on the pitch (what a season he's had) with sensible, team-oriented interviews that deflected attention away from himself, "the man". After all the recent tantrums, ill-advised comments and debacles, this newfound captain's maturity is a credit to both Gerrard and his mentors, not to mention a welcome surprise.

And I didn't really understand the fuss about Momo Sissoko until last weekend's F.A. Cup victory over Man. Utd.

Most would agree the key area Sissoko needs to improve is his passing. Most would also say the ability to pass, if not with the visionary brilliance of an Alonso, Kaka or Bergkamp at least with the dour consistency of a Wilkins, Makelele or a Keane, is a vital element of the trade of a central midfielder.

Never mind the visionary. Until last weekend, I hadn't even seen the dour and dependable from Sissoko. I thought it was a case of not being able to put in what God's left out. I didn't believe Sissoko had it in him to pass the ball.

Until last weekend. The United game was the first time I've seen Sissoko pass consistently and successfully, and to one of our players. Even better, it was also the first glimpse I've had of vision and creativity, of thinking, waiting for the right moment and then finding the angle. Now I'm not saying he'll ever become an Alonso or a Kaka, because he won't, but I do now think he could equal, or even better, Makalele or Keane in the passing department. Is it the calming influence of understated master craftsman Didi Hamann, the exposure to the vision and genius of Alonso and Gerrard or just committed hard work by Sissoko himself? It's impossible to know. But the United game marked in my eyes a change for the better in Sissoko's game.

In fact, when it ended, Sissoko's performance pleased me more than the fact that we'd beaten United in the Cup for the first time in 85 years. It felt very good to be wrong again.

Posted by Setsunai at February 23, 2006 9:21 AM