If you told me that his argument started a decade ago I would believe it.
Rafa confirmed as new Chelsea boss
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LOL, Facts are different, of course he was good at it. But you know them, so no need for me to recite Valencia, CL x 2, Best placed finishes in years etc (oops!). And of course, Keane and Acquafanny were errors, just like Veron, and Taibibi. You'll have to do better mate.
Very good.
Let's change the name of the Forum to "Six Crazy Years" in honor of the dedication to discussing Roffa.
Omg. Did you just compare Rafa to Fergie.
I wonder why I talk to other people sometimes.
Point is everyone signs a few duds. Even some of the most successful managers. Which I think you know, you chancer.
No. Its a sad and desperate attempt to back up your ill fated and frankly laughable 'He cared to much much' schtick.
But honestly mate you carry on. Im almost POSITIVE that the next European champion winning side he takes over he will succeed at. Im sure of it.
That's every bit as much an example of special pleading as anything localny said. While I despise Ferguson I wouldn't ever deny that he's an incredible manager. but he has most definitely fouled up in the market in his time, and in a big way. It's a perfectly respectable point to make.
Just dont talk to women about football. Thats what i do.
Did you see Rafa today on Football Focus? He claims his Spanish agent doesn't have a good grasp of English and that's why he let the 'interim manager' term be included in the contract, and Rafa signed it in a rush. I guess he hopes the rest of us don't understand the term 'disingenuous'.
The interview is here for those interested to watch:- http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/21629137
He was actually doing fine, and then this awkward bit came out maybe at about the 4:10 mark of the clip. He never really answered the question of why the word "Interim" got under his skin I think.
Mm hmm
Benitez song today was hilarious.
Stephane Henchoz says he is not surprised that Rafa Benitez is having problems at Chelsea, after his experiences playing under him.
The former Swiss defender was managed by Benitez during his spell as a Liverpool player.
He said: “I think he’s a very good manager because he knows a lot about football and the details. The only problem for me is his man management and I’m not surprised things aren’t going well at Chelsea.
“I think he has some arrogance about him, the way he speaks to the players and the way he treats the players, is not always the best.”
The Spaniard and Chelsea have have been the hot topic this week following his ‘rant’ about the club’s fans after their FA Cup win against Middlesbrough.
The Blues fans have made it clear that they do not want him at Stamford Bridge long-term and during the Premier League game against West Brom, there were several negative banners and chants aimed at their interim manager.
Henchoz continued: “Even if you are professional you would like the manager to have a few words and speak to you. He only speaks to you when he needs you or wants something from you.
“Even Steven Gerrard and Jamie Carragher who spent a lot of time with him, didn’t like him that much. When Roman Abramovich signed him as Chelsea manager, I was sure that things would not go smoothly.
Read more: http://www.talksport.co.uk/sports-news/football/premier-league/130303/henchoz-i%E2%80%99m-not-surprised-things-aren%E2%80%99t-going-well-rafa-benitez-chelsea-19286?#ixzz2MWOYT9En
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The former Swiss defender was managed by Benitez during his spell as a Liverpool player.
He said: “I think he’s a very good manager because he knows a lot about football and the details. The only problem for me is his man management and I’m not surprised things aren’t going well at Chelsea.
“I think he has some arrogance about him, the way he speaks to the players and the way he treats the players, is not always the best.”
The Spaniard and Chelsea have have been the hot topic this week following his ‘rant’ about the club’s fans after their FA Cup win against Middlesbrough.
The Blues fans have made it clear that they do not want him at Stamford Bridge long-term and during the Premier League game against West Brom, there were several negative banners and chants aimed at their interim manager.
Henchoz continued: “Even if you are professional you would like the manager to have a few words and speak to you. He only speaks to you when he needs you or wants something from you.
“Even Steven Gerrard and Jamie Carragher who spent a lot of time with him, didn’t like him that much. When Roman Abramovich signed him as Chelsea manager, I was sure that things would not go smoothly.
Read more: http://www.talksport.co.uk/sports-news/football/premier-league/130303/henchoz-i%E2%80%99m-not-surprised-things-aren%E2%80%99t-going-well-rafa-benitez-chelsea-19286?#ixzz2MWOYT9En
Follow us: @talksport on Twitter
You could counter that argument with what Didi, Sami and JC have all constantly said about him.
As I said in another post, I think Rafa was a good manager who did some wonderful things for us though I do wonder if he's lost it a little; his last efforts have been far from glorious but that's not my reason for questioning his state of mind now. The decision to take over Inter after they'd just done something which he could never match while being managed by a manager he's had plenty of verbals with was just daft. In fact, unfathomable.
What I'm curious on is whether you can point to a club that supports your statement above. To this point in his career he's not managed to deliver when given control. In fact, at the first club he had control (us) it was while working with the team that he had the least input with that he delivered the most.
That's just not true in any meaningful way. In 2005 everything aligned itself in some mad way to produce an amazing result, but the teams after were all better and more influenced by him, culminating in the best team, that benefitted from the most influence from him (4 years' in the making by that point) which was the near title winning team of 2009.
Next thing we'll have people quoting Mourinho's bollocks statement that we got worse every year under him.
Next thing we'll have people quoting Mourinho's bollocks statement that we got worse every year under him.
He built a wonderful attacking unit that really should have won something - it's just unfortunate his desire to rid us of Alonso (for
Partially because Alonso was phenomenal (dunno if it was the Barry saga, or just him hitting his peak form ... credit to him for being professional) - and we shouldn't have let him go ... It was a terrible mistake.
But everything clicked that year - Reina was excellent, the defense was fantastic, the midfield trio of Xabi, Mascher and Gerrard were great, Riera was solid, Kuyt was phenomenal bar one two month stretch, Torres was en fuego and our role players produced. We had everything we needed to win the league. I'm still not quite sure how we didn't do it ...
Purslow (though him and Rafa were never close) actually raises some interesting points here, though I really can't believe that the contract he had under T&G gave him 'greater power than the normal manager.'
As for his management issue re: treating all players equally, that was obviously going to be a problem at Chelsea. I think that would work with a '2nd tier' (i.e. us ... or a Atleti/Valencia in Spain) team, but not a team like Chelsea.
And lastly - his record isn't that bad ...
Benitez at Chelsea
Played: 28
Won: 15
Drawn : 7
Lost: 6
As for his management issue re: treating all players equally, that was obviously going to be a problem at Chelsea. I think that would work with a '2nd tier' (i.e. us ... or a Atleti/Valencia in Spain) team, but not a team like Chelsea.
And lastly - his record isn't that bad ...
Benitez at Chelsea
Played: 28
Won: 15
Drawn : 7
Lost: 6
I'm not confusing ambitions - just being realistic based on what AVB & DiMatteo did ... Rafa isn't doing badly, considering he wasn't really given a chance to fix the holes this team clearly had.
Is the average still 6 for games lost by a title winner? Considering when he took over, I guess it's not disastrous, but as you said, they'd spent big (and well) in the Summer so had enough amunition to push on and be a force. One thing you'd have expected Rafa to do would have been to make them more organised, but their frailties are still there. He was onto a hiding for nothing though.
As for Henchoz, I think alot of players respect Rafa for what he did, more than a few have given an insight into how cold and selfish he could be though, including our captain.
I think it came down to getting too many draws at Anfield (7).
20.09.2008 0 - 0 Stoke
22.11.2008 0 - 0 Fulham
01.12.2008 0 - 0 West Ham
13.12.2008 2 - 2 Hull
19.01.2009 1 - 1 Everton
22.02.2009 1 - 1 Manchester City
21.04.2009 4 - 4 Arsenal
... and losing to Boro at the Riverside stadium after the draw against Man City and beating Real Madrid 1 - 0 in the CL. Imagine going from beating Real to losing to Middles-fucking-brough in the space of 4 days. Middles-fucking-brough who were relegated at the end of the season with the joint worst points record with WBA that season.
Torres missed that game, and we started Nabil El Zhar when we had Yossi and Riera on the bench. El Zhar, who was getting his first league start of the season, in a game in a crucial stretch. The same Yossi who had just scored the winner at the Bernabeu. That was also the game with the Skrtel horror show at RB I think.
Relive the pain:
Source: http://www.lfchistory.net/Articles/Article/2696
Fitting end to Reds title dream
MASTERS in Madrid, miserable in Middlesbrough – Liverpool may have few peers in Europe but the Premier League is still beyond them.
All too predictably, a memorable European victory has been followed up with a forgettable domestic defeat and one so gut wrenching that the away end at the Riverside had emptied long before the final whistle.
There have been worse Liverpool performances than this under Rafa Benitez but not too many and this colourless display was a fitting way for Liverpool’s title hopes to evaporate for yet another year.
In reality, such dreams came to an end with last week’s draw with Manchester City and the Reds’ latest nightmare at the Riverside simply confirmed what everyone already knew.
It might be hard to accept given the rivalry between the two clubs, but the truth is that Liverpool are not good enough to compete with Manchester United over the course of a league season and the superiority of the reigning champions will again be confirmed come May – and maybe even before then.
The history books will tell us that Middlesbrough beat Liverpool by two goals to nil on Saturday and that scoreline will never be in dispute.
But the travelling fans who endured an afternoon of abject misery will rightly point to the paucity of their team’s performance and claim that it was not the real Liverpool, not having seen them succumb so meekly to a side which hadn’t won a single league game for three months previously.
How is it possible to go from beating Real Madrid in their own backyard to being all too easily overcome by Middlesbrough in theirs, all in the space of three days?
That is the question which Benitez needs to find the solution to if Liverpool are ever to lose their tag of being over achievers in Europe but under achievers in England.
At first glance the answer is simple – his squad is sorely lacking the strength in depth necessary to compete week in, week out given the extreme rigour and continuous tests that come as standard in the Premier League.
The big opportunity was lost last summer, not on Saturday, when the chance went begging to make the improvements needed to make the leap from also-rans to genuine challengers.
None of the players who were signed back then started at the Riverside and this in itself is a damning indictment of a transfer strategy which was quite clearly flawed.
Robbie Keane has been shipped off to Spurs, Philipp Degen remains on the treatment table he seems attached to, Andrea Dossena has barely figured and has looked out of his depth when he has and Albert Riera has lost his way in recent weeks following a decent start to his Anfield career.
Team sheets do not always give a foolproof pointer to the likely result but there can’t be too many Liverpool fans who were filled with anticipation at seeing a starting line-up which featured Martin Skrtel playing out of position at right back, Nabil El Zhar on the right, Dirk Kuyt on his own up front and Ryan Babel selected.
In fairness to El Zhar, the young Moroccan offered fleeting moments of promise only to be let down badly by his finishing skills, while Skrtel cannot be criticised for struggling in a role he had never previously played.
For Babel it is a case of the less said the better because any scrutiny of his display would invariably lead to questions being asked about whether the reported £11m Liverpool paid for him is missing a decimal point.
Let’s just say the Dutchman spent the 90 minutes doing little more than jumping out of tackles, ducking away from headers and showing such little passion for the shirt he was wearing that Rick Parry will surely have to hold the Anfield exit door open for him come May.
Babel was the worst of a bad lot as Liverpool allowed a promising start to the game to come to nothing thanks to a combination of their own profligacy in front of goal and their ongoing frailties at set pieces.
After a series of chances had come and gone Xabi Alonso was the unfortunate scorer of the own goal which meant the hosts had a number one accompanying their name on the scoreboard for the first time in almost nine hours of league football.
From that point on things went from bad to worse and Liverpool’s football deteriorated alarmingly as passes went astray with increasing regularity, allowing Middlesbrough’s confidence to grow.
Last season Liverpool produced a performance of only marginally higher quality at the same venue but on that occasion they had Fernando Torres to bail them out. This time that task fell to substitute David Ngog – another of last summer’s dubious signings – and the Frenchman could not fill the Spaniard’s shoes.
By the time Tuncay struck Middlesbrough’s second it was more a case of the Anfield outfit being put out of their misery than of it being added to.
There was to be no thrilling comeback this time around and Benitez acknowledged as much when he substituted both Jamie Carragher and Steven Gerrard and raised the white flag on Liverpool’s title hopes.
The inquest into where it has all gone so badly wrong for Liverpool will have already begun because having looked like the only team ready to battle it out with United just a couple of weeks ago they are all of a sudden in the sights of fourth placed Aston Villa.
It was little over a decade ago that the Reds finished fourth in a two horse race and there will now be very real fears that history could be about to repeat itself, particularly if they can be swatted aside with such little fuss by a Middlesbrough side which has played the whipping boys role for most of this season.
The most disappointing element of what was only their second defeat of the season is that after going two goals down Liverpool did not display the character and belief which has served them so well throughout the campaign.
It was as if they sensed the game was up on their title challenge and could not raise themselves for a battle which form and logic suggested they could not win.
Now everyone at the club has to steel themselves for the unpalatable inevitability that Manchester United will soon join them on 18 league titles.
Alex Ferguson may not have knocked Liverpool off their perch just yet but he is about to join them on it and there is now little anyone at Anfield can do to stop them.
Trophy hopes now rest in Europe where it is to be hoped their quest for glory will be longer lived than the one at home.
MATCH FACTS
Middlesbrough 2 – 0
(HT 1 – 0)
Liverpool
Alonso (og) 32
Tuncay 63
Bookings Tuncay 64
Bates 76
Middlesbrough's Percentage Liverpool's Percentage
Corners 2 18% 9 82%
Goal attempts 5 23% 16 77%
On target 3 30% 7 70%
Fouls 2 25% 6 75%
Offside 5 71% 2 29%
Middlesbrough Bradley Jones, Emanuel Pogatetz, Matthew Bates, David Wheater, Justin Hoyte, Robert Huth, Julio Arca (Josh Walker, 88), Gary O'Neil, Stewart Downing, Sanli Tuncay (Adam Johnson, A, 79), Jeremie Aliadiere (Marlon King, 68)
Liverpool Jose Manuel Reina, Sami Hyypia, Fabio Aurelio, Martin Skrtel, Jamie Carragher (Yossi Benayoun, 71), Steven Gerrard (Lucas Leiva, 76), Javier Mascherano, Xabi Alonso, Ryan Babel, Dirk Kuyt, Nabil El Zhar (David N'Gog, 68)
Referee Styles, R
Venue The Riverside Stadium
Attendance 33,724
Copyright - Liverpool Echo
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