ACCORDING to the popular press, the vast majority of Liverpool fans were urging their team to run up the white flag against Chelsea last Sunday to help prevent Manchester United from claiming their 19th League title.

Well, the team delivered on that score – but I didn’t see anyone laughing around me.

The stunned silence which settled on all of Anfield bar a section of the Anfield Road End was borne more of embarrassment at the gulf in class between the two sides than a quiet satisfaction that our deadliest rivals might be deprived of another trophy.

Those who wanted to read conspiracy into the performance had plenty of fuel for their deluded allegations: Steven Gerrard’s back pass, and the general torpor of our response once we had fallen behind.

To suggest complicity from our captain is just plain insulting, and ignores his ‘previous’ in this respect against Arsenal and France; and for those who thought we showed little fight to get back into the match, you only have to go back to the home game with Arsenal to see an identically weak-willed reply to a similar setback. There was no intrigue here, just incompetence.

In that sense, it was perfectly in keeping with this most desperate of seasons.

Yes, we’ve had to cope with injuries, a beach ball, bad luck, poor referees, volcanoes, attacks by the Kraken (OK, I made the last one up), but the majority of our troubles have been of our own making.

From the disastrous pre-season, we’ve stumbled from one disaster to another with the majority of players seemingly incapable of rising to the challenges that have been thrown their way.

And while they must bear a significant part of the blame for their failure to stand up and be counted when we’ve been deprived of Fernando Torres, Gerrard and others, the ultimate blame must rest with the manager.

This team is broken, and things need to change.

The case against Rafa Benitez is sadly becoming unanswerable.