While silverware is always fantastic to win, victory in the Carling Cup final does not give our lads permission to take the foot off the gas in the knowledge that qualification for Europe next season is ensured.
There are too many players on that field, naming no names as I'm sure I don't need to - I know them, you know them and whether or not Kenny Dalglish admits it, he knows them - that are now going through the motions with very little desire to win.
We were unlucky against Arsenal, accepted, but the display against Sunderland was poor by any teams standards and, whether or not we were able to claim fourth spot in the Premier League, that is not the level of football that the club or the fans deserve to see. We will not be playing Champions League football in 2013 unless that changes.
While we all love Kenny for what he has done for us in the past and his obvious passion for Liverpool Football Club, we all know that we need to see better players playing better football than what we saw at the Stadium of Light. For him to say that we 'more than matched' them was embarrassing. Firstly, we should be doing a lot more than matching them, secondly, somebody has to take responsibility. even if individuals aren't named, at least come out and say that we need to pull our socks up! Gone are the days when the manager would give quotes to a newspaper hack for inclusion in the Pink that evening for reading by fans who couldn't make the game and wanted to know how well we played. We all saw how woeful we were, so admit it!
Finally, lets touch upon Dalglish's hatred for 'new journalism'. He has been outspoken about his hatred for rumours circulated around Twitter and shoddy journalism in using these rumours to generate news articles, but if you don't want to be written about on the back pages then tell your players to stop giving soundbites to the press.
Glen Johnson should not be reigniting the Suarez/Evra debate and Luis Suarez certainly shouldn't be making comments about liking Paris St Germain. If you want to put a lid on gossip then its not @billynomates with three followers on Twitter you want to be pointing the finger at Kenny!