Gerard Houllier: A fine decent man, destined to manage Liverpool
By Phil McNultyChief football writer
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Gerard Houllier won a treble of cups with Liverpool in 2001
Gerard Houllier, who has died aged 73, may just have been destined to manage his beloved Liverpool Football Club.
Houllier came to Anfield on a joint-management ticket with incumbent Roy Evans on 16 July 1998 - but the seeds of his arrival were sown 30 years earlier when he stood on the Kop watching Bill Shankly s great Liverpool side while teaching French at the nearby Alsop Comprehensive School.
He deserves to be remembered as the man who had the strength of character and talent to revolutionise Liverpool, making them successful once more when he took sole control after the inevitably unworkable arranged marriage with Evans came to an end four months later.
Liverpool owe Gerard Houllier so much as inevitable legacy led to Jurgen Klopp
Ian Doyle pays tribute to Liverpool legend Gerard Houllier who has passed away at the age of 73
17:50, 14 DEC 2020
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Bill Shankly transformed Liverpool into a bastion of invincibility. Bob Paisley tweaked the Reds into a ruthless trophy-winning machine. But there’s little doubt the origins of success in the modern era at Anfield can be traced back to Gerard Houllier. Houllier, who has died at the age of 73, dragged Liverpool kicking and screaming into the 21st century during his six years in charge, and helped begin the shifting of mindset at a club too reverential of its past and seemingly reluctant to embrace the future.
Photo by B Kanaris/Liverpool FC/Liverpool FC via Getty Images
I have a confession to make. Liverpool FC isn’t the first club I supported. As a little brother to a United-supporting elder brother, I flew my Anything But United (ABU) credentials proudly. When Blackburn Rovers challenged (and eventually pipped) them for the title in 1995, I gleefully adopted them as my team to rub salt into his wounds. Little did I know that Alan Shearer was about to depart, and United would win the title another three times before the decade was over. Bad decision. As fortunes turned for Blackburn, culminating in their relegation in 98/99, it was getting increasingly difficult for 10 year-old boy in Singapore to follow their fortunes. How many times could I look out for their box scores in the back pages of the newspaper, with zero idea what the Championship Table looked like? I had no choice.