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Kenny Dalglish keeps smiling as future remains uncertain

An emphatic victory against Chelsea secured the not-so-dizzying summit of eighth position. Temporarily, at least, Dalglish's job concerns were forgotten.

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"Let's end the season on a high," was the plea from Kenny Dalglish before Liverpool's final home game of the season. This performance provoked a most unpredictable outbreak of vertigo on The Kop. An emphatic victory against Chelsea secured the not-so-dizzying summit of eighth position. Temporarily, at least, Dalglish's job concerns were forgotten.

There will be those who will argue that the new signings who have contributed to a home campaign historic in its dreadfulness turned up three days too late. Ten months would be a more accurate appraisal.

Either they proved Dalglish right all along, or deeper questions will be asked as to why it has taken until the last home game of the season for the most recent arrivals to offer value for money. This performance partially assisted the court of King Kenny, and partially undermined it in exposing the falseness of Liverpool's lowly position.

Jordan Henderson, Andy Carroll and Stewart Downing were instrumental in ensuring Liverpool fears of being reduced to a peripheral, walk on part in Chelsea's romance were swiftly banished. It had seemed the fixture calendar enjoyed a final cruel joke at Liverpool's expense by offering Chelsea manager Roberto Di Matteo a northern detour on his FA Cup victory parade. Liverpool found consolation by ensuring it was not an extended lap of honour for the Londoners.

The questions about Dalglish's position will not go away despite his team's dynamic display, but he ensured those answers can wait until after the final game against Swansea.

In fact, Dalglish and Di Matteo started and ended the evening sharing common ground. Neither knows if they will be managing their teams at the start of next season. Therein lies the vast difference in ethos between those at Anfield and Stamford Bridge, a contrast which supporters of both clubs cherish.

If a Liverpool manager won the FA Cup and beat the best team in the world to lead his club into the Champions League final within the space of a month, there would be calls for a new a statue near the Shankly Gates. At Chelsea, it doesn't even make a permanent deal a formality.

Equally, it is doubtful a team in ninth and recovering from a cup final defeat would attract such a passionate and sympathetic crowd at Stamford Bridge. Liverpool's fans possess a pathological unwillingness to accept the overriding sense of deterioration which has infiltrated their league campaign. They believe it can be corrected - a Liverpool fan will always look for an exit from any pit of despair rather than accept his fate. The same is true of Dalglish.

One couldn't help recall the meeting between these sides in the Champions League semi-final seven years ago. The noise, the irresistible sense of hope and the knowledge history was being made. For the coachload of Chelsea fans who bothered to head north, that anticipation remains, this being one of the final stops on the road to Munich. Liverpool must wait longer for a revival, but at times of greatest strife, Anfield's choirmasters have a solution to the club's ills. They sing "You'll Never Walk Alone" even louder. Bizarrely, sometimes in this stadium it still works. Of course, this was in no way comparable to 2005, but there was an unexpectedly celebratory atmosphere here last night, demonstrating a refusal to submit to a mediocre league climax which would have seen Dalglish's second coming end with a whimper.

He needs tangible evidence that this team can go from eighth to fourth next season, and fourth to a title challenge in the two years following that. There would be unanimous agreement Dalglish should stay if those indicators were there.

There hope in the presence of Luis Suarez, whose impish brilliance prompted Michael Essien's own goal, and even from Carroll, hopeless for the first year of his Liverpool career, but all of sudden a waking giant.

The club's owner, Fenway Sports Group, are currently assessing if the vision they had for the club is already under threat or the league regression is just an anomaly that can be swiftly corrected by hitting the post less. If they retain faith in their iconic manager, Dalglish will be back in his bubble jacket in August. If not, and many at Liverpool believe the decision has privately already been made, the next 10 days will see Dalglish pay the price for the home truths of the last 10 months.

This entertaining Anfield finale may be his swansong. Realistically, Dalglish knows the sixth home win of the season won't repair the damage of those other thirteen winless encounters.

But if you're going to go, do so in style. Should this prove a second farewell for Dalglish, at least he bowed out in with that characteristic smile on his face and with a lingering memory of the delight of those who will never stop supporting him.

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