Well, it's been a more exhausting week than anyone of us could have imagined. It pushed back our season review a full week, so we'll get to goal, player, disappointment, most improved player of the year then before moving on to our player by player review. The weekend will be rife with rumors of who's coming to interview and who isn't, but I think we all need a break. So use this to discuss those buzzes, and of course the huge match tomorrow afternoon where we'll all be drinking German beer during. I assume.

If anything breaks, of course we'll be back to cover it.

While FSG may say there's no rush, their actions say something else. Roberto Martinez has already been approached, and has been granted permission by Wigan chairman Dave Whelan. Combine this with the buzz last week, well before Dalglish was punted to the curb, that Martinez was being looked at as a replacement and it's hard to see that he isn't FSG's leading choice at this point.

Whether he should be or not is up for debate. What's encouraging to me is that he's had success, relative to those clubs, at two different places. I always get urpy when the name of a manager who brought one club to over achievement is mentioned to take over. Maybe their success was built on simply being in the right place at the right time with the right players, and he wouldn't be able to duplicate that.

Martinez has. He brought Swansea from the relegation zone in League 1 to a near miss in the Championship playoffs. He's kept Wigan in the Premier League three straight years with barely any recognizable talent and in a style that would sit well with Liverpool fans. I'm already sort of dreaming about Agger-Skrtel-Kelly and Suarez-Carroll-whoever in Martinez's preferred 3-4-3.

But obviously, there are questions. You never know if a manager can transition from a small club with limited expectations and resources to one with true ambition and money to play with. You can't play the low-expectations card at Anfield. He has no European pedigree. He has as much to prove as some of the players he would be taking over. It's no guarantee.

We don't know how long the process will take. I'd like to see Villas-Boas get an interview as well, because we know he has something to prove. He also instills a style that would sit well with the Liverpool Way, and more specifically a formation and style that seems to fit well with the personnel already on hand (generally going with a 4-3-3, though with genuine wingers which Liverpool don't have a lot of).

It's gotten to be a much more interesting summer, hasn't it?

Sometimes, you end up being psychic without meaning to be.

Just broke, but Kenny Dalglish has left Liverpool. I doubt anyone is going to say they're shocked. While details won't come out until a press release in about an hour, and even then I doubt we're going to get anything more than usual boiler plate filler, the reasons have to be obvious to all.

Let's take his standing at the club, his legend, his accomplishments, and his name out of the equation for a minute. What you're left with is simply not good enough. Lowest point total in half a century, a bloated transfer budget that didn't produce anything, and a directionless club. The last part is what gets me. While the final results wouldn't be acceptable, they would be understandable if the team was actually going through some overhaul. If kids were tried out at every position before they were ready, if veterans were moved out simply because they won't be around when Liverpool are a true threat again.

But let's face it, that didn't happen. Jordan Henderson was bought for the future, we were told, and then hardly allowed to grow at the position he will man when he truly matures. Andy Carroll was shunned for almost three quarters of the season, usually in favor of Stewart Downing or Craig Bellamy (who rarely could manage 70 minutes) or some other combination, and we know how Downing went. While my opinions on Kuyt are clear, he was instrumental in the club's revitalization last season under Kenny, along with Maxi, and yet both were hardly used. Both certainly had more of a role to play.

If it was a ruthless streak Dalglish wanted to show to his more experienced players, how did Jamie Carragher get into the FA Cup Semifinal? Why was Fabio Aurelio not ever, ever an option to give a gasping Jose Enrique a breather? Is Jay Spearing so limited that he was always going to look like he took a step back? I'm not so sure.

It's all simply not good enough.

But it's not that simple when you're dealing with Kenny Dalglish, is it? You can't simply throw out history and his place at Anfield, can you? Well, a forward-thinking management does. Because no matter what he's accomplished, clinging to that when the current team is falling is how you end up in a real mess. And Liverpool may already be in a real mess, and if they're not they can certainly see it without binoculars from where they are.

Where now? We'll have plenty of discussion for sure. Obviously, Roberto Martinez is going to be the favorite, and as I said yesterday I would be in favor of that. But is he the man to immediately gain the players' respect upon hearing his name? Will Luis Suarez, Daniel Agger, Martin Skrtel, and whoever else is of Champions League quality think he's the man to bring it to them at Anfield? You have to wonder. Will Dirk Kuyt and Maxi, useful squad players if nothing else, wait long enough before leaving to see if they still have a role to play? Can whoever they bring in move Henderson and Carroll down the road of development to become real weapons that only some of us see if we squint real hard? Only time will tell.

There will be other names. Rafa Benitez has been out of work a while, if he's not waiting around to take the Spain job after Euro 2012. But did he lose touch with Gerrard and Carragher enough to be welcomed back? His problems mainly came from ownership, and now it's new owners. Not totally unlikely. Paul Lambert's name might get thrown around too, as he's done probably even better with Norwich than Martinez did with Wigan. Andre Villas-Boas? He was shunned at Chelsea for doing what they kind of asked him to do, i.e. make over an aging squad. Would he want a non-Champions League job? You can't argue with what he accomplished at Porto, he simply can't be a bumbling idiot.

But that's what's to come, and I don't want to throw any more dirt on Kenny right now. Because we owe him for last year, when things looked a lot more hopeless than they do now. That team was headed for way worse than 8th and 52 points, or at least that's what it felt like. And the football was abhorrent at times. Kenny changed all that, and at least made us believe again. Things could have been so much worse.

I hope whatever bitter feelings are around eventually subside, and Kenny can be a part of the club again one day. It wouldn't be Liverpool without him. But his part isn't in the manager's office, and if you can ignore all he means, you'll see that was pretty obvious.

Apologies for the lack of anything yesterday. Was helping someone important move house, and you know how that can get.

Before we delve into various "...Of The Season" candidates and before we go through the squad one by one to figure out where Liverpool are, I wanted to do a general impression post. But now, with the rumors starting to bubble about managerial change, that probably has to be addressed first.

As you've probably seen by now, there's an eerie silence from the men upstairs about the future of Kenny Dalglish. This is peculiar, because at a few points this season someone has stepped up to claim Kenny is the manager, be it Tom Werner or John Henry coming down from their castle to do so. This time, with two days after the season, we haven't heard anything. This could be because they're insulated back in Boston instead of Blighty where the press can get at them. Could be something more, no one seems to know.

The name that keeps popping up to replace Kenny is Roberto Martinez. While acknowledging Kenny's place at the club and all he's done for it and the supporters, and the uproar it might create among supporters and players, I have to say I would be all about this.

I know the concerns. He's only ever kept Wigan just barely hanging on in the Premier League. Last time Liverpool tried that is partly how we ended up in this mess with Roy Hodgson. But Martinez's preferred method of play would fit far more into what Liverpool want to do than Ol' Roy's did. I doubt Martinez would tell Daniel Agger to not play out of defense. I know some would complain he's never had a big time job before. That's valid, though these days it might have to be debated just how big-time the Liverpool job is now. It has no Champions League to offer, and limited cash though by no means barren. The leading names of Europe simply aren't coming to Anfield, no matter how much we dream. It may just be that Liverpool have to take a chance on someone from a "lower" club and hope he's up to it. Kind of worked out long ago at that club down the M62, didn't it?

Martinez has earned himself a shot at bigger job. What he's done with Wigan, and Swansea before that, is hard to argue with. He has barely any money and support at Wigan, and he's kept them up, and usually with entertaining football. Maybe it's time to take that chance.

As for Kenny, it's hard to dislodge a legend. And he doesn't want to go, making any exit an ugly one indeed. But results are results, aren't they? 52 points. Lowest since 1954. If the argument is the squad is being built for the future, than the lack of development of those who might bring it is scary. Jordan Henderson, Martin Kelly, Jay Spearing, the only recent flashes from Andy Carroll come to mind. And some of the transfer policy, which Kenny claims he directed, fly in the face of "transition". Charlie Adam and Stewart Downing aren't young, and they certainly didn't take a step forward when given a chance at a "big club".

And maybe, just maybe FSG thinks that this clinging to history is part of the problem. While Dalglish provided relief in the previous season that could have ended up uglier than this one, for a club that needs to take steps forward and do things in a new way, he simply may be too out of touch to do so. While Liverpool should never forget who they are and what they've accomplished, the clinging to "the way it was" might not be healthy for anyone. It is time to realize where Liverpool are now, and that's handicapped by simply not having the funds of most of their competitors. The name will carry less and less caches among people across Europe the longer dominance is not found at Anfield. Liverpool, now, are not United, or City, or Madrid, or Barcelona, or Milan, or Munich. They are more aligned with the Dortmunds, Valencias, Fiorentinas or Romas. Maybe it's time to start acting like them. After all, Dortmund has back to back Bundesliga titles, and they didn't do it by trying to be Munich.

It was a day full of drama, elation, heartbreak, heroes, villains. The spine-tingling we all must have felt at the unrestrained joy of Man City fans when Aguero's shot hit twine, and that joy being multiplied by a factor of six at the shots of devastated Man U fans. The relegation battle, the Champions League chase. There are imaged and moments from this morning that we will remember forever, and giggle about for years to come.

And then there was Swansea-Liverpool.

I suppose it is apt and fitting that with the rest of the league rocking at the foundation at many points around the country, Liverpool were merely running out the clock. Merely making up the numbers in a celebration of all that Swansea have accomplished, and the Swans fully deserve their party day for what they've done and how they've done it, I can't really remember anything about the match that just kind of came and went. Feels like the season came and went, too.

For long stretches of the match, Liverpool were spectators to the oozing confidence and swagger of a Swansea side that has been fearless all season. Their belief in what they're doing and their style is something we've gasped to see from our favorite club for what, three seasons now? It's there, you can almost see it at times, but still isn't to be grasped. And it doesn't feel like it's getting any closer to being locked in our palms. That's what's so frightening.

On a day with so many memories, Liverpool supporters only have questions and theories. We don't really know anything more about the team than we did when they ran out against Sunderland at Anfield in August. The clamor for changes is as loud as it was last summer, if not more so.

And while most of us reveled in the pure chaos of the day, and a true example of why we've committed so much of our time and emotion to wrapping ourselves in it, there has to be more than a small pang of frustration and sadness that Liverpool were involved in none of it. Whether the heartbreak or the glory, Liverpool were on the sidelines, barely even a witness. And that's not where they and we belong.

We have months to discuss what should come and what will. The postmortems and eulogies of this season will be written here and all over the place.

And yet, as I watched all the....fuck, I don't even have a word for what went on today, and though I felt somewhat left out of it all, and the jealousy started to percolate, I don't think Liverpool are as far away from being some part of it in the near future as it might feel and others will tell you. But those moments, when Liverpool are front and center of the league's and world's watching eyes, are part of the memories created and the talking points discussed, even if they come in a year's time, are not immediate. Once a season is over, it's not the next season you're waiting for, but what next season will bring. And sadly, as with every disappointing season, this day after the last game means you're as far as possible from finding out.

We'll start the review tomorrow, and we'll go player by player over the coming weeks. We'll pick a player of the season, a goal of the season, a disappointment of the season, and on and on. We'll discuss the rumors and the actual transfers, and whatever other changes come our way.

And we'll do that in the hope that when this post is written a year from now, Liverpool are in some way part of events that matter.

...and then we're done, and we can go home.