http://www.anfieldroad.com/news/201005063612/lfc-chairman-must-deal-with-damage.html/By Tom Wilson and Jim Boardman
On Saturday a senior Liverpool official made it perfectly clear that there was absolutely nothing to read from the fact that Reds boss Rafa BenĂtez was yet to meet new chairman Martin Broughton. He claimed it was all part of some plot to paint a false picture of disharmony at Anfield. He got on great with Rafa and Rafa was happy.
Even now itâs difficult to work out how he thought anyone would fall for that. Or why he seems to tell different stories to different people. People compare notes, compare what heâs told them, then shake their heads.
On Saturday the senior official said that there had been one meeting planned. It would have been ahead of the first-leg of the Europa League semi against Atlético Madrid, but volcanic ash put paid to that idea. When the call came out for the squad to meet up at Runcorn station, the meeting was unsurprisingly called off.
Obviously the new chairman is quite different to the last man to have the job all to himself. David Moores used to travel on the team bus with the squad; Martin Broughton doesnât come across as someone who would feel comfortable slumming it across Europe in first class with the players.
According to the senior Liverpool on Saturday, no other meeting had been scheduled so far. The first opportunity following the journey to Madrid would probably have been tied in with the return leg a week later, but with Rafa unavailable until after midnight it was decided, the senior official said, that there was no time for the chairman to meet the manager. Presumably the chairman â who of course has other responsibilities away from Liverpool FC â was unable to pop round to Melwood the following morning.
That following morning, the Friday, had been the day before the senior official was explaining why there hadnât yet been a meeting. And at almost the exact time as the senior Liverpool official was explaining why there hadnât been a meeting so far, the clubâs official site was making it clear that the next opportunity for a meeting was also going to be missed.
Liverpoolâs last home game of the season was the following day, the Sunday, against the team Martin Broughton has supported all his life, Chelsea. Broughton had presumably set off home early on Friday morning after watching the AtlĂ©tico game, and he told the official site he wouldnât be coming back up for that Chelsea match. He wasnât even going to be in the city for the game, he didnât want to be seen to celebrate any Chelsea goals. âThe only sensible thing is for me to stay at home and watch it on the television,â he said.
So he wasnât exactly making himself available for a meeting with Rafa, which in itself isnât really a major issue. Heâd cleared off before Rafa was available on the Thursday night, he didnât stick around on Friday to meet then and he didnât come back up on Saturday in preparation for the Sunday match, so no chance of squeezing a meeting in there.
Rafa did want to talk to him, but there clearly hadnât been time. It was frustrating but understandable. Surely a meeting would be held before the week was out, with no game for Liverpool Rafa would have more room in his own diary to match up with Broughtonâs no-doubt hectic schedule.
But then came the story on the BBC website, and other BBC outlets, soon to spread like wildfire around the rest of the media.
âLiverpool boss Rafael Benitez has cancelled two scheduled face-to-face meetings with the clubâs new chairman, Martin Broughton,â wrote David Bond, the BBCâs replacement for Mihir Bose as Sports Editor.
Bond had the same title at the Telegraph before joining the BBC, but will be best remembered by Liverpool fans from his time as the paperâs Chief Sports Reporter. From knowing full details of Gillett and Hickâs refinancing deal with RBS before it was announced, to publishing emails DIC and Amanda Staveley had been sent by Hicks, Bond was clearly getting information from people inside and outside the club during that very turbulent period.
So who would be talking to him now? Whoever it was wanted to add more weight to the campaign to see Rafa hounded out of the club. âIt is understood that he [BenĂtez] pulled out of talks with Broughton last week and another the week before,â wrote Bond.
As has just been explained, Rafa did not cancel any meetings with Broughton, and whatever any fan thinks of BenĂtez, or where his future should be, the fact that someone from Liverpool is trying to smear the manager should set alarm bells ringing loud and clear.
This is about far more than Rafael BenĂtez. This is just the latest in a long line of examples of the press being briefed about Rafa in a way that certainly wasnât designed to be supportive of the manager. What other lies are being peddled?
Even Bond seemed to be unsure of exactly what the story was, writing: âIt is not clear why Benitez cancelled the meetings with Broughton, although the last two weeks have been affected by preparations for Liverpoolâs Europa League semi-final meetings with Atletico Madrid. The first week in particular was heavily disrupted as Benitezâs team were forced to make the long journey to the Spanish capital by road and rail after flights were grounded by ash from the Icelandic volcano.â
BenĂtez didnât cancel the meetings, but if he had it was probably slightly more important he got on that train at Runcorn than staying back to meet Broughton. Even Rafa canât be blamed for the volcanic ash. So why would someone at Anfield feed the BBC this âstoryâ?
There arenât too many candidates for the source of this latest leak. Bond said it came from a Liverpool board member: âThere is some surprise inside the Anfield boardroom at the timing of Benitezâs call on Tuesday for an urgent meeting with Broughton to discuss the future.â
Bond was one of the first reporters to interview Martin Broughton after his appointment, so perhaps he is a candidate for this story being fed to the press. But Broughton wasnât at the club when the earliest briefings against Rafa began, to other members of the press. Of course itâs always possible that somebody else told Broughton that Rafa had cancelled the meetings. Someone wary of Rafa actually getting to meet the chairman, and telling the chairman exactly what has been going on.
One subtle hint that somebody was talking out of turn came in one of the infamous Henry Winter columns. In November he wrote: âThe impressive managing director, Christian Purslow, is not the type for knee-jerk reactions. But it is known around Anfield that Purslow has talked to BenĂtez about his style of management, notably his cold detachment from the players.â
So back in November someone from the club was telling Henry Winter that BenĂtez had been given a dressing-down by Purslow, that BenĂtez was being told how to manage his players, essentially being told how to do his job. And itâs as obvious as it looks exactly who it was that impressed this information on Winter.
That wasnât all that Winter learned from his new source: âLiverpool can afford to sack BenĂtez,â wrote Winter. âCompensation would be less than ÂŁ5 million under the âmitigating the lossâ principle if he found employment.â Which perhaps should now have Winter scratching his head as to why impressive people would be on the phone to him angrily criticising the manager instead of just sacking him.
And itâs not as if Winter wasnât afforded the opportunity to ask that question. No prizes for guessing which senior Liverpool official spent a good part of the bank holiday weekend frantically phoning around trying to get his side, or one of his sides, of the story over. It was almost as if he was frightened that the truth might come out. And Winter had a chance to challenge this particular Liverpool board member on where his stories didnât really add up. But some reporters would rather just take the information theyâre fed and repeat it, hoping thereâs plenty more where that came from, than question what they are being told.
Having managed to get so many column inches out of the politicking of a certain LFC board member, Winter completely missed the irony of his opening paragraph: âIf Rafael BenĂtez truly respects Liverpool Football Club heâll leave Anfield today. The players have lost the faith, the boardroom is unimpressed with the politicking and the supporters are suffering, albeit in silence.â
When the truth does come out about a certain LFC board member and his efforts to keep the truth from the supporters, perhaps that silence will be broken. And maybe that silence needs to be broken. Maybe the efforts to keep the attention on BenĂtez to take it away from the failings of the Managing Director and the owners he worked for need to be emphasised a little more. And that might just be a bit messy â but whatâs new? Thatâs how itâs been at Anfield for some time. âIf he stays, the inevitable long goodbye becomes indescribably messy, distressing for all concerned and demeaning to a club of Liverpoolâs great history. This is not a warning for BenĂtez, this is a fact,â wrote Winter. The same fact applies, but much more strongly, to the clubâs temporary MD.
Bill Shankly was the man who made Liverpool great, the man who brought so much of that âgreat historyâ to the club. Nobody knows what he would have made of Benitez; chances are he would have seen good and bad in him and he could well have been saying Rafaâs time was up by now. But it doesnât take a lot of imagination to work out what he would have thought of the clubâs owners. And it takes even less imagination to work out what he would have thought of Christian Purslow. And less still what he would have thought of the tactics employed by the clubâs current custodian to force Rafa out.
Shanks would also have torn a strip off Henry Winter had he ever been unfortunate enough to cross his path. Winter wrote of Rafa: âHeâs got a centre-back at left-back and a holding midfielder at right-back.â With the only two left-backs at the club injured, what else was Rafa meant to do? One thing Rafa tried was putting the right-back at left-back, which was why the holding midfielder played at right-back on the Thursday. By the Sunday the right-back was injured too, which is why the centre-back went to left-back, and the holding midfielder stayed at right-back. This isnât a string of excuses; itâs just some simple facts. Liverpool have to make do and mend.
Christian Purlsowâs arrival coincided with spending on transfers that, going off the fees available in public, went from being ânet spendâ to ânet profitâ. Liverpool brought more in than went out last year. Thatâs the calendar year 2009.
When Winter used the phrase âHow embarrassing,â in his article it surely should have been to describe his own willingness to stick up so transparently for his source in the Liverpool boardroom. And really his article didnât deserve much more time than that, as went into some kind of rant out of sympathy to his new friend on the board at Anfield.
That new friend should have the balls to stand up in public and say what heâs saying privately to the press, if he truly believes it and feels it would stand up to scrutiny. But he knows that, despite claims to the contrary, most Liverpool fans either want BenĂtez to stay or only want him to leave because they feel heâs been worn down by the unnecessary pressures of the past few years. The vast majority of fans will always consider BenĂtez a hero, whatever happens.
And that is what frightens the board member. He knows that sooner or later the manager will blow him up for what heâs done. He knows that more and more people are starting to see through him. And he knows that if he sacks the manager heâll never be forgiven.
Liverpoolâs new chairman was appointed in a non-executive role. The senior Liverpool official constantly points out that the new chairman was appointed in that way, and that he has no control over the actual running of the club, that heâs merely there to sell the club.
But the senior Liverpool official fails to mention something very important about the role of a non-executive director. According to the government-commissioned Higgs report, non-executive directors âare responsible for⊠where necessary removing, senior management.â
Surely a senior Liverpool official briefing the press against the clubâs manager, over such a sustained period, is grounds for his removal. His decision to bad-mouth the clubâs owners, however accurate it might be, is hardly the best way to attract ÂŁ100m of investment. And that was his major objective when appointed. Perhaps he wanted to delay the partial sale to prolong his own career as Mr Liverpool, to help build up that empire. Is this not also grounds for removal? To discuss transfer targets â even if they are his own, not the managerâs â with the press is also grounds for removal. The list goes on.
And that, Martin Broughton, is where you come in. You need to get to the bottom of this mess and you need to get to the bottom of it fast.
Itâs not just your reputation that depends on it.