Oh my god! They've killed Kenny

As I battled post-EPL season finale trauma, with my mood too dark to enjoy any sports, and my integrity preventing me from watching reality rubbish on the commercial networks, I reverted to SBS for some stimulation.

The latest episode of South Park was showing.

To be honest I’m not a huge fan of South Park. While I really enjoy animation, and think some of the gags very clever, I’ve never been a real devotee.

That is until I sat through this brilliant episode.

The story starts with Kenny, a fan favourite and a real icon of the show. Kenny is a little slow. He’s also vulgar, temperamental, and is renowned for his oft-muffled and indiscernible speech. But because of his popularity with the fans, an evil and mysterious collective known only as Fenway Sports Group, decide they want Kenny to help them revive their struggling ‘saker’ team, called Liverpool FC.

So Kenny packs his bags and flies to Merseyside in England to restore this once proud and successful club to its former glory. Unfortunately for Kenny the team is in crisis when he arrives, having been sabotaged by the dastardly and devilishly boring Uncle Woy.

So Kenny, together with his friends Stan Marsh, Kyle Broflovski, Eric Cartman and Moneyball expert Damien Comolli, put together a strategy to bring splendour back to Liverpool. Sensible Stan and Kyle advised Kenny to use the money from selling their first female player, the gorgeous Torres, wisely. Don’t overspend: look for proven continental talent, and stay away from over-hyped English players.

But Kenny doesn’t listen.

Instead, under the influence of the free-wheeling Cartman and cashed-up Comolli, Kenny embarks on a real spending splurge. He buys Henderson for 20 million after Comolli tells him a Jordan is available. Kenny loves ‘Rhythm Divine’ so he signs Enrique for 7 million. Cartman takes an upper so Kenny signs a Downer for 20 million.

And he pays 35 million for Andy Carroll, inspired by his insightful editorial ‘Beer swilling and pie eating in the 21st Century’ featured in Modern Drunkard magazine.

Kenny’s Liverpool starts season 2011/12 full of optimism and enthusiasm. Unfortunately for Liverpool and its fans though, Kenny doesn’t really know anything about ‘saker’.

He instructs his players to aim for the goal posts and crossbar, a significantly more difficult task than just kicking the ball into the goal, which they perform with aplomb. He plays bingo with the team formation, alternating between 4-4-2, 5-3-2, 4-1-3-2, 3-2-1-2-1-1 and his personal favourite 2-2-2-2-2 each week. He plays musical chairs with the starters and the bench.

And after one of his players is accused of racism, in a gesture of goodwill he leaves a big, burning crucifix in the front yard of the victim.

Kenny is very confused by the public backlash and outcry.

By season’s end the fans are distraught, as Kenny’s plans and tactics fail the once mighty club. With Kenny in charge they achieve their lowest league finish in 49 years, closer to the foot of the table than the top. Their win percentage is an appalling 37% (rounded that up for the sake of the poor Scousers). Kenny’s faithful fans only got to celebrate 6 wins and 24 goals at their home stadium, the lowest tally of home goals since 1903/04, when Kenny was just a boy.

During the final game of the season, Liverpool fans could be heard singing a lovely little ditty:

“We got us a dour Scottish git,
Who really thinks he is a hit.
His tactics are rubbish,
His players brain dead.
We could have signed Alex McLeish or Steve Kean instead!”

A few days post season finale and Kenny receives a summons from the mysterious FSG to fly to Boston. As Kenny checks in at the airport he realises they’ve only booked him on a one way flight. Confused (as always), Kenny contemplates calling them to ask about his return flight.

But well aware of his lack of communication skills and general incoherence, Kenny decides to board the plane.

‘Everything will work itself out’, he muses to himself. ‘I’m King Kenny of the Kop.’

Sadly Kenny never did find out about the return flight, or anything else for that matter. And as the screen fades to black all you could hear is Kenny’s good friend Stan Marsh screaming, “Oh my God! They killed Kenny! You FSG bastards!”

Like I said, that episode was simply brilliant.