STEVEN GERRARD has described former Rangers player El Hadji Diouf as the worst he ever played beside.
The former Liverpool captain recalled the night Diouf spat at a Celtic fan during a 2003 UEFA Cup match, which he saw as being typical of a bad professional who had "no real interest in football."
In the Daily Mail's serialisation of his autobiography, Gerrard does not miss his mark on a player who during his brief spell at Rangers couldn't manage to keep out of trouble.
He said: "Of the bad ones, I don’t really want to waste time thinking about El Hadji Diouf but it’s worth highlighting his wasted seasons at Liverpool as an example of how it can all go wrong.
"Gerard Houllier, a very good manager and a usually wise judge of character, signed Diouf in the summer of 2002. Gerard bought Diouf for £10m from Lens - solely on the recommendation of his former assistant, Patrice Bergues, who had coached Diouf there.
"I understood why Gerard rushed through the signing, but he did not really know Diouf as a person. He was one of three new signings which were meant to turn Liverpool into Premier League champions.
"We had finished as runners-up to Manchester United the season before and a combination of Diouf, Salif Diao and Bruno Cheyrou was supposed to drive us to the title. It was probably the biggest waste of £18m in Liverpool’s history.
"We finished the season in fifth place and Diouf had sealed his place at the top of the list of Liverpool signings I liked least.
"It seemed to me that Diouf had no real interest in football and that he cared nothing about Liverpool. For example, the way he spat a huge globule of gunky phlegm at a Celtic fan in a UEFA Cup match at Parkhead in March 2003 summed up his contemptuous and spiteful demeanour.
"A few people have since asked me if I saw any comparison between Diouf and Mario Balotelli - and I’ve always said no. I’ve got respect for Balotelli; I’ve got none for Diouf.
"Balotelli can be endearing sometimes — and that’s never a trait that you would associate with Diouf. The only positive aspect of the otherwise ugly signing of Diouf is that he worked hard on the pitch. He always wanted the ball, and he never hid.
"But after a while I decided Diouf simply wasn’t your usual footballer. It seemed to me as if football got in the way of his social life."
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