INTERNAL AFFAIR

I first watched this Hong Kong movie called Infernal Affairs a few years ago. For those who don't really know the story, here's a very short spoiler of what happened: Two young officer cadets go to the same police school. Andy Lau plays a protege to one of the most-wanted criminals in Hong Kong, who is installed as a mole in the Police Force, where he rises to detective. Tony Leung is dispatched to become a spy in that very gang that Andy Lau's loyalties lie. As both sides struggle to find who is the traitor, there is a classic rooftop scene in which both moles face off.

Leung: I am a cop. (Points gun at Andy Lau)

Lau: Who knows that?

It is a tragic movie about divided personalities, and is a movie that has so many twists that in the end you'll be spinning in your seat catching your breath.

I am talking about this movie because it seems so similar to the strange dark cloud that has settled over Anfield's board room this season. Coincidentally, acclaimed American director Martin Scorcese thought that he could make a Yank version of the movie, too. He called it The Departed.

Martin Scorcese won an Oscar for this, which is pretty surprising, because I felt he took off the class from the original and made it chock-full of the violence that you'd expect from his movies.

In any case, the movies made me think of the two leading roles at Anfield right now - Tom Hicks and George Gillett, Jr. We have constantly been made to believe, by the media, that the guy to hate, lock, stock and barrel, to be the Texan guy who said he was impressed by Jurgen Klinsmann.

But where has ol' George been all this time, eh? The 'quiet American' went into the buyout of our beloved club after snagging the guy with the purse, Tom Hicks. For a moment it seemed that he was the one with the passion for the club - until he suddenly disappeared sometime after November and never re-emerged.

In the meantime, poor Tom Hicks - probably never that good with words - mentioned that George and himself had been looking for an insurance policy. NOT John Hancock, NOT AIG, NOT even Prudential, but a German guy who used to dive for Tottenham Hotspur.

So in the meantime we got to our business of defending Rafa, thinking that Hicks is the bad guy, when he's actually the one who raised his hands after his partner shot the golden goose. In recent reports, Rafa has kissed and made up with Tom Hicks, and it seems ever clearer that the man in the sidelines might have been the one up to mischief.

When he finally let loose one final objection - that 'my partner cannot sell without my approval' - it made me realise something. This was the guy who was pulled in to purchase the club last minute - but he's the guy who least wants to leave. At least, that's how it looks like from my perspective. This was the rooftop scene, all over again. The last stab of justice, before the inevitable starts to happen.

Tony Leung's character will die at the end of the movie, without a proper identity, killed by a traitor in the Police Force. Tom Hicks will leave at the end of the season, probably hated eternally by most Liverpool fans, because he tried to do the impossible by holding the club together even after the breakdown of a fragile business partnership.

Somehow, I don't think that Tom Hicks is holding out just for profit. A niggling feeling tells me that we have maligned this innocent Texan. While I awaited eagerly for George Gillett to come out to make his stand, he has failed to do so - and a present screw-up, in my opinion (in the case of Hicks) is still much better than an absent one.

No matter what happens at the end of the season - and I strongly believe that Hicks will be gone by then as well as Gillett - I know that he has been the lesser of the two evils in this Axis power era. He made the effort to design (and redesign) the stadium, and was still the main man in the purchase of Fernando Torres. And coming out to tell everyone that they wanted Klinsmann as a 'replacement', 'insurance', or whatever you call it was a darned stupid thing, although on the other side it was a brave admission of error - typical perhaps of the Texas way (being brave, I mean).

George Gillett? Like a snake, he has slithered out of the trouble that brewed at Anfield. Foster, his son, one of the directors at Liverpool, has disappeared for weeks now in the boardroom, and if Dubai do successfully purchase the club in the months to come, all I will remember about him is that he was part of the shorter side of Merseyside in more ways than one.

Some people will ask why doesn't Tom Hicks hold on to his stake if George Gillett sells. Yet we must understand the stark differences in management styles of the DIC and the Americans. This puts Hicks in a thorough dilemma. I doubt he will want to let his dormant partner hold on to a valuable 50% stake and do nothing for the club, yet he's not exactly enthusiastic to look at DIC representatives eye to eye during board meetings.

Having said that, all I want as a fan will be stability for next season, and not all these Infernal Affairs-like drama occurring behind the scenes. For now, I turn my attention to the return of the prodigal son, Michael Owen, to Anfield, as we face off Newcastle United.