Rafa Benitez, Football Manager

what's the point in you starting this thread if your mind's already made up?

well, I was gonna say PR skills, Chris, but I didn't want to prejudice the attitude that the press 'had it in for' Benitez, so I went with that instead. I was trying to be fair, tbh.

i think it's fair to say that the press did have a problem with rafa. their problem being that he didn't cosey up with them and give them what they wanted.

It's to discuss it.

Seriously.

It always clogs up other football threads, and Matt's very right in saying that the WC thread is absolutley no place for it.

I'm not going to have my mind changed, it's true- neither are you, I guess. but while we're gonna have it out let's have it out in a nice space where we don't repeat ourselves at least.

I think it's fair to say that Rafa tried to pull off many many rubbish excuses in many many interviews that very many people were sceptical of, and he would always blame the press for this.

which excuses?

are we discussing his abilities as a football manager, or how he handles the press? ferguson and wenger aren't exactly immune to making ridiculous excuses. what manager doesn't make excuses/moan?

Bonus point

love this guy & his sideline demeanor

dont give a shit about british soccer but he reminds me of a mean dad

How you handle the press can be a positive skill or a fault if you're a high-level football manager, come on. Mourinho, Ferguson can both be accused of being childish, far from admirable etc in their dealings with the press, but they're still masters at using it for their own means.

Wenger, less so. Rafa, less so again.

Abilities as a football manager- what we're discussing. That's more than tactics.

rafa benitez excuses

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Quick list c&p from 2007:

IN

Josemi £2m FAIL
Antonio Nunez £2m FAIL
Xabi Alonso £10.7m SUCCESS
Luis Garcia £6m Success?
Mauricio Pellegrino Free WAS CHEAP I GUESS
Fernando Morientes £6.5m FAIL
Scott Carson £750,000 FAIL
Antonio Baragan Compensation fee WHO?
Jose Reina £6m SUCCESS
Mohammed Sissoko £5.6m FAIL
Boudewijn Zenden Free WAS CHEAP I GUESS BUT THEN HIS WAGES...
Peter Crouch £7m LOL
Jack Hobbs £750,000 FAIL?
Godwin Anti Free WHO?
Miquel Roque Free LOL AT THIS LIST
Jan Kromkamp Swop for Josemi LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL
Paul Anderson Swop for John Welsh FAIL
Daniel Agger £5.8m SUCCESS
Craig Bellamy £6m DID THAT ONE THING AGAINST BARCELONA
Gabriel Paletta £2m FAIL
Mark Gonzalez £4.5m FAIL
Fabio Aurelio Free DID OK I GUESS
Jermaine Pennant £6.7m LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL
Dirk Kuyt £9m MATTER OF OPINION AT BEST
Alvaro Arbeloa £2.64m SUCCESS
Andriy Voronin Free LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL 50k a week wages
Lucas Leiva £6m FAIL SO FAR
Sebastien Leto £1.5m FAIL
Fernando Torres £20m HAS PLAYED ABOUT SIX MONTHS OF FOOTBALL FOR LIVERPOOL
Yossi Benayoun £5m SUCCESS
Ryan Babel £11m FAIL
Charles Itandje Free FAIL

---------

£127.44m

Up until last season he was in charge of the second highest spending team of the decade. For that he had... Torres, Gerrard (hg), Masch, Skrtel and Reina that would made them better than Spurs, man for man?

I'd take Skrtel off of that, Spurs don't get away with murder so he's pretty worthless to us.

ok yeah my bad.

There are problems with copying and pasting a list of players like that. Rafa was quick to recognise when players weren't working out, and got rid of them, making a profit on quite a few of them. Your opinions on 'fails' are just that. Lucas, in my opinion, is a success. You don't win Brazilian player of the year for nothing. People who think Lucas is a bad player know fuck all about football. If his name was Claude Makele people would be jizzing their pants.

Itandje for example, was a reserve GK. I'm, not sure what your expectations are for a reserve GK, but he seemed to do the job pretty well. Until of course he acted like a fool at the Hillsborough Memorial Service last year and was banished for doing so.

Sebastian Leto ffs, he was a kid with potential who spent most of his time at the Academy. Didn't develop in the way Rafa hoped, sold him for a profit.

Not being able to bring yourself to put - Torres-Success just marks out how bullshit your list is tbh.

You don't win Brazilian player of the year for nothing.

He didn't win this btw, he won most promising youngster which as an Arsenal fan, I can tell you is a loooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooot different.

Also yeah I think insulting everyone at the Hillsborough Memorial Service is enough to make him a fail, considering his job is basically to sit there and NOT insult people.

Fabio Aurelio "did ok"? fucking awesome in my opinion, but has been blighted with injuries and has moved on.

yeah crazy of me to think spending 20m and 90k wages on a player would expect more than him either not playing or just looking ridiculously unfit for 7/10ths of a season.

Barragan, another Academy kid who the press have jumped on, not researched, expected him to be fucking lionel messi and wet themselves when he didn't play regularly. if you want a proper discussion then at least do some research and don't just copy/paste a list and make ridiculous calls on players you obviously know nothing about.

Given that Crouch pretty much single-handedly kept them in the Champions League one season you're being a bit harsh on him.

Peter Crouch wasnt happy playing 2nd fiddle to Torres so moved on.

Sissoko, fail, REALLY?

Positives-

Made them a beast defensive outfit, tough to beat and successful in games against top 4
Tactics pwned all over Europe, his continental record was amazing
Got the best out of Gerrard most years
Signed Torres, Reina, Alonso and Mascherano
Safely delivered 2nd when Chelsea and Arsenal had terrible seasons

Negatives

Consistency/record against mid-lower teams was p. poor
Stretches of collapse every season under him
Never looked like a league winner, claimed otherwise every year
PR disaster when beaten/under pressure- Often hung players/owners/club out to dry when it suited him
Football dour & ugly
Aside form the players mentioned above, transfer record alarmingly poor
Record of bringing players through- non existent
Alienated key players needlessly throughout his term, notably Alonso.

No better than Houllier domestically.

yeah my bad i should do more research than benitez ever did.

"press have jumped on"??? haven't they been too busy saying LOL ROBBIE KEANE OR GLEN JOHNSON OR AQUILANI OR ETC ETC ETC ETC

Jack Hobbs, fail? ffs. Academy kid who signed when he was 16. has gone on to captain Leicester.

Yeah what a great success he turned out to be for Liverpool in their Leicester City captain role.

rafa knew robbie keane's price was ridiculous and didn't even want him. missed some horrible sitters, poor positional play, 'Arry bought him back for £16m (!) and sent him on loan to Celtic. Nice one.

If the world is allowed to say lol jeremie aliadiere then jack hobbs + the 40 other no name 16 year olds benitez bought shouldn't be above judgement.

Pretty good cricketer though

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport/furniture/in_depth/cricket/2001/ashes/legends/jack_hobbs.jpg

i think you'll find a lot of the fans are made up rafa hung the club/owners out to dry to be fair.

(Sorry Chris I'll be kind of in and out on this one for a while)

Rafa was quick to recognise when players weren't working out, and got rid of them, making a profit on quite a few of them

His job wasn't to rectify his mistakes, it was not to make so many of them all the time. He never stopped making them.

Lucas, in my opinion, is a success. You don't win Brazilian player of the year for nothing. People who think Lucas is a bad player know fuck all about football. If his name was Claude Makele people would be jizzing their pants.

Perhaps you should stop judging Lucas on his brazilian POTY status, especially with reference to how Rafa Benitez has managed him. His name isn't Claude Makelele, and the acknowledgement that he's been pretty poor in the majority of his games at LFC is a very important step towards reason imo.

We can hopefully try to stay away from the 'You know fuck all about football' trope. It's almost exclusively used on the Rafa side of this debate ime, but let's all admit that we're none of us complete morons, and that we all watch and judge games on their own merits here pls?

aliadiere at least played for arsenal's first team. you're judging jack hobbs on what exactly?

Didn't Rafa publicly court Keane which made Levy all pissy and add another couple million to his price tag?

So Aliadiere did better than 2 caps Hobbs... how is that not a failure of a signing??? WORSE THAN ALIADIERE.

i think you'll find a lot of the fans are made up rafa hung the club/owners out to dry to be fair.

― The referee was perfect (Chris), 09 July 2010 15:10 (7 seconds ago) Bookmark

:) no doubt, but it was more from the 'Benitez doesn't own up to, nor in fact move to rectify, his obvious mistakes' which imo is fairly characteristic of his time at LFC.

i'm judging lucas on the fact that last season he contributed to a number of vital goals, he's intelligant, has great awareness, is disciplined, and his passing and tackling rates were amongst the highest in the league. i like him.

I think we've come to the point in following football where we can understand that Makelele isn't the only anchor man in the game. Lucas doesn't even play like Makelele, a role that Masch is more inclined to fill since he's been there.

Jack Hobbs- kind of a youth team product?

I wouldn't rly be judging benitez on this kind of thing under 'transfers', but he'd certainly be questionable on bringing through the level of talent expected from youth/reserves- especially as his transfer hit-rate was, by and large, pretty poor.

Lucas- a prospect, but not at DM, and shouldn't be played alongside Mascherano for 90% of games like he has been. Benitez' handling/selection of him has done him no favours- and that's allowing that he might be a better footballer than he has shown so far.

Yeah I don't think anyone is writing off Lucas's career and I think under Woy he could turn out to be quite an important part of Liverpool's set-up. He just failed as a Rafa player/signing.

as i keep saying, i wouldn't blame rafa for failing to bring through talent. the talent simply wasn't there, and that was down to archaic scouting practices and poor coaching.

talent simply wasn't there? from the same place that could be seen as on a par with utd and west ham in great players for the past 20 years? (owen, mcmananananananaman, fowler, carra, gerrard etc.)

the talent is all over the other 1/2 mile of Stanley park? won't wash.

Will Roy do better or worse than Rafa in the league, Chris?

i will say though that yes, perhaps rafa should have given the likes of dani pacheco more of a chance, and i would have liked to see him start a few more games, but if he feels he's not ready then i guess that's his prerogative. rafa gave martin kelly his debut in the champions league and looked solid. would have been a good replacement for glen johnson but he had injury problems. dani ayala made 5 appearances at centre back.

^^^golden generation.

will roy do better or worse than rafa? i don't have a crystal ball i'm afraid.

http://cdn.whoscored.com/img/blog/2012%2f11%2fBenitez-Progress.jpg

That we never saw the real Liverpool 09/10 team breaks my heart

http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2012/12/04/article-2242919-1658B912000005DC-269_634x367.jpg

may have been misquoted, but seems to think he will definitely manage liverpool again

would ye take him over brendan rogers today

I'd let him do the cups

oh man, he'd be so good at Celtic

he'd do a better job than Neil Lennon imo

every team and their fans should get the opportunity to experience rafa as manager.

He's a multiple European trophy winner, I'd expect him to do a better job than Neil Lennon!

as long as he could bring in 4 or 5 players he'd do fine

i think it seems clear he was riffing on a stupid journalist question- will u ever return to liverpool rafa- i'd better the wife n kids is there innit *BOING* bdumdumdumtcch classic

he has a great chance to fuck over mourinho by taking chelsea out of next year's champions league

Manager of the month for April>>>

Can't dent he's been doing well recently

oops I meant to say deny

4th european final for rafa

More special than you-know-who?

well in rafa lad

Piggybackin previous managers for most of em

http://img.thesun.co.uk/multimedia/archive/01683/rafa_1683915a.jpg

pedigree

4 European trophies to Jose's 3.

http://i.imgur.com/mmQ6EQW.jpg

More likely to go in than if Torres had hit it tbh.

"I prefer to remember only the positive things from my time at Inter," the 53-year-old stressed to Minuto 116.

"For example, the fact we won the Italian Super Cup and Club World Cup.

"However, many people pass judgment without knowing what really happened. The truth is that the club and technical staff sat down together to plan a renewal of the squad, including the names of new players, but these suggestions were never followed.

"The way I see it, this was the cause of everything that happened at Inter that year and possibly even in the following campaigns."

puedes decir revisionismo oportunidad

Napoli have agreed a fee of €37m (£32m) with Real Madrid for striker Gonzalo Higuain according to reports in Italy but the deal is still far from done.

EMIRATES CUP 2013 TICKET DETAILS:

Saturday 3rd August 2013
Galatasaray vs FC Porto (2pm)
Arsenal vs Napoli (4:20pm)

thats about 48m to madrid for higuain, albiol and callejon if it goes through

idk if higuain is going to be as enthusiastic about napoli as madrid are

idk, cl qualified with apparent ambition and wherewithal... i'd be persuadable

gotta be some resonance there for an argentine no?

just re albiol and callejon, curious how badly spanish players tend to do in italy. mendieta the best ever?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luis_Su%C3%A1rez_Miramontes

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luis_Su%C3%A1rez_Miramontes

there has never been great success transferring between the two, at least since luis suarez the elder at inter, or vieri at atletico

napoli just doesnt seem quite....there, as a cl team

they have had a good side for 4/5 years but somehow between di laurentiis, the regular robberies/burglaries of players, suggestions of camorra nonsense

this year is ddl going big tho, between rafa and his declamations of a '€125.5m' transfer fund

feel like higuain would choose inter above them (or arsenal) cl or no cl

http://www.footballitaliano.co.uk/images/articles/dossenarafa.jpg

"The pillow suggested the line up to me," Benitez smiled the following day. "It's very intelligent."

Rehabilitation continues, the bomdas double negative multiplication move to chelsea was genius

Napoli's Spanish manager had reached an agreement in principle with West Ham United for next season, but this morning scenarios changed quickly: Benitez has had a direct contact with Hammer's chairman and he has declined the offer of the English club because... because Real Madrid is strongly interested in him.

Looking frwd to seeing Ronaldo/Bale track back like Kuyt.

If it didn't happen in Spain, it didn't happen.

http://www.skysports.com/football/news/11678/10585048/rafa-benitez-wants-united-front-from-newcastle

"We need to realise we're now the head of the mouse, and not the tail of the lion. It's a Spanish expression," the Newcastle manager said.

was reading joey barton's book at work today. apparently he'd agreed a deal to come to lfc the summer houilllier was sacked but thought it would still go through until rafa insisted xabi was bought instead.

book is p funny btw. goes on and on about footballers lacking self awareness at the same time as stating that he was the best midfielder in england outside gerrard/lampard and claiming that should have gone to the world cup ahead of owen hargreaves amongst others. oh and if he'd have discovered sports psychology earlier in his career he would have been england captain.

out

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/Sb9JOfryGaU/maxresdefault.jpg