Robbie Keane joins Steven Gerrard, Dirk Kuyt, Daniel Agger and Pepe Reina as well as former Liverpool players Peter Crouch and Jerzey Dudek on the list of Liverpool players whose homes have been burgled in recent years.

Last year we dismissed the conspiracy theories, but what if the people behind at least some of the robberies are the same (unless the city of Liverpool is suffering from a case of copy-cat burglars who only target Liverpool FC players)?

Who could be behind these dastardly deeds? We’ve got 5 ideas:

5. Hicks and Gillett

The Liverpool owners have already proven themselves to be businessmen first and football men… never, so what’s to stop them from stealing from their own to pay off the interest on the loans they took out to buy Liverpool because they didn’t want to use their own money?

4. Rafael Benitez

Rafa is non-traditional in his treatment of his players. He benches the good ones and subs in the unknown ones. He sells the good players and buys other people’s trash. Occasionally he throws you a beauty (Torres, Champions League) but the end-effect is that you’re kept guessing what he’s going to do next.

Could this be a form of a punishment for not playing well? A trick to keep the players’ minds off his rotation policy? A chance to steal knickers (they’ve already taken some from Clancy and Curran, why not Palmer)?

3. Manchester United

There are rumours that the Liverpool robberies are part of a world-wide burglary operation to help Manchester United pay off their ginormous debts. The indicators are there - world-wide conspiracy, Americans and picking the wrong targets - everyone knows the money’s in London.

2. Osama Bin Laden

Because you can’t ever be completely safe from the Taliban, anywhere (but apparently we live on just fine). Because it’s 7 years on from 9/11 and the world has suffered an extraordinary amount of pain and suffering - the equivalent of an elephant tearing up the forest because an ant bit him on his tail. Because he’s backing the Sheikh’s takeover and wants a player-revolt to drive the price down.

1. The Players Themselves

We’ve got strong evidence (conjecture, really) to suggest that players are using these burglaries as part of a greater scheme to engineer a move away from Anfield. Crouch and Dudek have already left. Kuyt is making eyes to Hamburg.

Then there’s Reina who is tired of being wrong every time he says Liverpool and title in the same sentence. Agger is scared of Hyypia. Gerrard has a crush on London (Barry was being bought to keep Gerrard, not fill the left-flank). And Robbie Keane has already realised the sheer stupidity of his move to Anfield.

So who is it - the Taliban? The Americans? The Brits themselves? Or is it the Spaniard?