Rafa Benitez Leaves Liverpool

[Hobo]

The BBC tells us that that sage of footballing wisdom Jamie Redknapp is backing Dalglish for the job. Grobelaar too. Then again we always knew Brucie was a little nuts. Jamie is just an idiot.

Hodgson, Mark Hughes, Dalglish, Martin O'Neil. I'd still take Hodgson.

[Farmer Reil]

Zola! Bluey will back me up.

[MGW]

I'd love O'Neill, but he won't leave Villa, and I just get the feeling Hodgeson will stay put at Fulham rather than move to an unsettled team, so my money would be on Mark Hughes, who'll do ok, but whoever comes in is going to have to work with fuck all money and desperatley try to hold onto Torres, Mascherano and Gerrard, loose them and we're fucked,

[IAceI]

Burning flags outside the ground? Who are these lot, Al-Qaeda?

[MGW]

Spirit of Shankley, they're a bunch of twats, just like the Green and yellow lot at United, it won't do anything, burning some flags isn't going to stop Hicks and Gillet being almighty Twunts who think a club with almost £400m of debt is worth £800m.

[IAceI]

I thought Spirit of Shankley said they weren't behind the latest protests and that people just did it, others heard about it and joined in - because apparently no one has anything better to do it seems?

Or were they the ones burning the flags at least?

Who are they trying to impress anyways? They've bought a flag and burned their own flag. Marvellous.

[therockbox]

Shankly.

They've got the right idea, it's just a shame the group is run by a bunch of amateurs who ruin any point the group has with 'heat of the moment' outbursts.

Still, it's better to at least be trying to stand up to the owners rather than just sit back and watch.

edit: Ace: Last night's protest wasn't organised by SOS, and as far as I'm aware the flag burning wasn't pre-planned by anyone other than the person that actually did it. They've had similar sorts of protests against Hicks and Gillett in the past though.

[9 to 5]

Oh My!

[stokeriño]

Not sure if I would make the move, if I were Redknapp. He tends to want to bring in a lot of new players (usually the same ones...), and the resources might not be there for him to do that at Liverpool. Not to mention the whole part about having just got Spurs into the Champions League, and no doubt wanting to take on the challenge of competing in it.

Although if he did move there, it would be hilarious if he signed Robbie Keane again.

[TCO]

Although if he did move there, it would be hilarious if he signed Robbie Keane again.

That was my immediate thought and it'd be so brilliant¬

I really don't know why Redknapp would make the move, Spurs are secure in every way, they're in the Champions League and are better than Liverpool at this stage.

[stokeriño]

Yeah, Spurs are one of those rare profit-making clubs at the moment. The only angle on which I think he could be persuaded would be if someone locked him in a room with a bunch of old Paisley-era videos until he got swept up by all the 'history' and/or 'prestige' of it all...

[MGW]

I said to the people in work back before Christmas I'd love Redknapp at Liverpool, I'd never even considered him to be honest, and still can't see him leaving Spurs, a financially solid team with Champions League football to come to us, with so money and a Europa League place, we may persuade O'Neill or Hodgeson to leave, but not 'Arry, i still think we'll get Mark Hughes

[Lineker]

Not a chance.

[Bigal]

So apparently Sven is interested. Thoughts?

[stokeriño]

The fact that Sven has said "I'm interested in the job" rather than Liverpool saying "We're interested in Sven" speaks volumes.

[therockbox]

I'm wondering if there is anything that Sven wouldn't do for money.

[Bigal]

Anne Widdecombe?

[Gazz]

Anne Widdecombe?

I phoned his agent, he wants 100 grand and 10% of the revenue if it's filmed and released as a celebrity sex tape.

[therockbox]

By Dion Fanning

Sunday June 06 2010

We are drifting on a sea of garbage accompanied only by hopeless bullshitters. It was no surprise that the departure of Rafael Benitez brought out the worst in what can loosely be described as his enemies.

Benitez' problem, and the reason his inspired reign as Liverpool's manager had to end, was that his ability to ignore the opinions of people who didn't matter had been irreversibly damaged by the battles he was forced -- and occasionally elected -- to fight.

In his mind, they were all his enemies in the end. But they were out to get him.

Sky Sports love talking to a man with nothing to say and they found an egregious bunch in the wake of Benitez' departure, speaking and thinking in clichés, led, as always, by Jamie Redknapp.

Next season promised more paranoia and more desperate justification. Much of what Benitez achieved -- the European Cup, the re-establishment of Liverpool as a force in Europe, the legacy (for a few more weeks, anyway) of world-class players -- didn't need to be justified, it was understood by those who needed to understand. At his peak, Benitez knew this. Recently, like Gerard Houllier, he had started to list his achievements and it wasn't going to end well.

A couple of weeks ago, Benitez walked onto the stage at the Liverpool Empire and danced beside the cast of a play about Istanbul. It wasn't ill-advised, it was fatally ill-advised. It may have been his low point as Liverpool manager.

It pointed to the insanity to come, but things got a lot worse for Liverpool last week when they rustled up a deal to get rid of the one man who understood the games that were being played. Benitez left listening to the same bullshit he had to put up with for six years. Now it was even more serious.

There is a fierce refusal by most commentators to deal with the complexities of life. They see the Liverpool story as another football story, they talk about the list of contenders with a straight face as they open up the market to include Guus Hiddink or bemoan the timing that now rules Jose Mourinho out.

They refuse to see what is happening. This is the slow dismantling of a football club. The one man who would put up a fight as Liverpool's prize assets were being sold is gone. The least surprising piece of official information last week was that Liverpool were in no hurry to make an appointment. They could save a couple of months' wages if they delay. More significantly, if there is no manager, there is no man to ask if he might see some of the money for the sale of the players Benitez improved while at the club.

He was, they said, fired for finishing in seventh place. Many suggested that the squad Benitez left behind is worse than the one he inherited. Two words should shoot down that argument: Salif Diao. Still debating, take another two: El-Hadji Diouf. What about a mixture of words and numbers: £14m for Djibril Cisse. Bruno Cheyrou and Anthony le Tallec were there when Benitez arrived. I haven't mentioned Djimi Traore. Benitez won the European Cup with him.

He competed too, not all the time, but above Liverpool's capabilities given their wage bill -- the fifth highest in the league -- which is linked inextricably to how a club performs. Benitez wasn't allowed to gather a squad. Craig Bellamy and Luis Garcia went so Fernando Torres could come in. He made a mess of his relationship with Xabi Alonso but still managed to triple the price for the player and the money went on servicing debt.

On Wednesday night, it was suggested that the reason for Benitez' departure was the need to placate the star players. When the star players got to hear about this, they were understandably upset that they were the device being used to justify the change.

There are enough suckers out there with short-term memories to sign up to that. By Friday, Torres, Javier Mascherano and Steven Gerrard were said to be leaving anyway. Benitez had lost the dressing-room but the dressing-room was up for sale.

This is the reality. If Torres and Mascherano stay, there is an argument for getting rid of Benitez. If they go, there isn't. Redknapp suggested Liverpool didn't trust him to spend £30m. Perhaps Tom Hicks and George Gillett just didn't trust the builders either and that's why there's no new stadium.

The fans knew this and they were pilloried for it too. It turns out that the media needs the fickleness of supporters because they don't know what to do but mock when it's not there.

There is no logical reason to appoint Roy Hodgson. He had a fine record prior to last season but Benitez had a better one. Liverpool are now judging managers on the basis of one season, good or bad. In another time, Sam Allardyce would have been the leading contender.

One report may have got to the truth about the eagerness to appoint Hodgson, a thoroughly decent man. "Hodgson, in contrast, is seen as a manager who will concentrate more on sorting out the many problems Liverpool face on the pitch rather than being involved in disrupting things behind the scenes."

Things are going so well behind the scenes that it will be a relief for Liverpool fans to know that their manager will not be disrupting them. Benitez had become caught up in the feuds. But at Liverpool, more than nearly any other club, it would be hard not to come to the conclusion that there was somebody else to blame.

Hicks and Gillett wanted to fire him before he even signed Torres, his outstanding purchase. But he stayed and fought them. He turned Gerrard into a truly effective player until last season when Gerrard turned in on himself and became a liability, not the man carrying the team as most pundits declared.

Benitez never gave him a break, he never gave anyone a break. He was Lieutenant Columbo and there was always one more thing.

He was always mad. But the good ones are all mad in their inability to see reason and another's point of view as things that have any bearing on how they do their job. "Like all madmen," Tolstoy said, "I thought everyone was mad except myself."

Benitez had good reason to think it. Working for Hicks and Gillett, he encountered, not only insanity, but greed and duplicity too. By the time he did his desperate jig at the Liverpool Empire, it was over. Liverpool are now dancing in the dark.

http://www.independent.ie/sport/soccer/liverpool-dancing-in-the-dark-without-guidance-of-benitez-2209743.html

[Hobo]

That is an excellent article.