Rafa and Journalists

I had/have my doubts about Rafa over some of the decisions he has made over the years but the more this witch hunt and pathetic campaign the media are runing against him the more i support him even when the results aren't going our way. Im fed up with these  ............. whatever you wanna call them cause i got alot of words i could call them at the moment. I read an article in the daily mail today about everton youngsters and liverpool youngsters and the dip sh*t journalist Ian Ladyman (says it all really) had a picture of three players from both teams and he has somehow managed to get the names wrong for the photos of Jay Spearing and Nathan Ecclestone. Could be a simple mistake but the way they go on like their the gospel of football pisses me off.

I dont pay attention to 90% of what the papers say its just infuriating to see articles about us that are rubbish, i guess thats life and theres alot of haters. All the sweater when we prove them wrong, rant over !

There are many instances now where you see a journalist saying good stuff about other managers, then you take a look at some of the things Rafa has been slated for and you find they are often the same. I don't think they like Benitez, do you.

Could it be due to Liverpool fans of yesteryears have done something so bad that the current journalists feel they have to take revange?
I meant, reading from what our fans are saying in this forum, the dislike and the hate from them are immense....

I don't actually call a lot of the British media writers Journalists, a Journalists job is to do factual unbiased insightful well researched reports on News/Sports and for the very reason the majority of the British media do not do this I give them the title of "Shithouses" as that is very fitting to them.

Lets be honest we have a Media base that loves to build people up so much placing them on the highest pedestal and making them teh darling of the British public, only for them to knock them totally off their perch at the slightest mishap.

I don't actually call a lot of the British media writers Journalists, a Journalists job is to do factual unbiased insightful well researched reports on News/Sports and for the very reason the majority of the British media do not do this I give them the title of "Shithouses" as that is very fitting to them.

Lets be honest we have a Media base that loves to build people up so much placing them on the highest pedestal and making them teh darling of the British public, only for them to knock them totally off their perch at the slightest mishap.

Yes but don't forget who buys the shithouses work even bigger shithouses surly

Never has the media gone against Ferguson or Wenger like they have Rafa Benitez it is totally uncalled for and even when we are playing at our best they decide to talk about the Mancs and how great they are etc etc.

Most newspapers are just slightly bigger gossip magazines. People who base their opinions on what they read in the gobs***e papers should be ignored and their opinion held as worthless.

Could it be due to Liverpool fans of yesteryears have done something so bad that the current journalists feel they have to take revange?
I meant, reading from what our fans are saying in this forum, the dislike and the hate from them are immense....

More like they were supporters of other teams during the 70s and 80s, when we were blitzing everything in our path.

was watching the chelski game , and the commentator was saying  about chelski , "thats a show of a great team , they bring the result  even playing bad"
 NOW did anyone  hear in our game something like that , and that is a bIG  NO

 how can you  have respect for most of these c*nts
 YNWA

I've got a theory.

After Rafa highlighted (accurately) how Mr Whisky McTaggart-f*ck gets away with murder last year don't you think its feasible that all these so called 'professional' sports writers (who've probably had countless complimentary all inclusive matchdays courtesy of Ratboys Sugar Daddy) received calls from him and certain favours were called in to attack Rafa with what has been proven to be false or exaggerated articles. This'll never be proven cos it'd mean a writer admitting he's unprofessional and can be bought.

If there's another explanation for the beatings Rafa's taken in the press please tell me cos i am 100% certain that my theory is good.

If you hadn't guessed i hate Scotty McF*cknose

I've got a theory.

After Rafa highlighted (accurately) how Mr Whisky McTaggart-f*ck gets away with murder last year don't you think its feasible that all these so called 'professional' sports writers (who've probably had countless complimentary all inclusive matchdays courtesy of Ratboys Sugar Daddy) received calls from him and certain favours were called in to attack Rafa with what has been proven to be false or exaggerated articles. This'll never be proven cos it'd mean a writer admitting he's unprofessional and can be bought.

If there's another explanation for the beatings Rafa's taken in the press please tell me cos i am 100% certain that my theory is good.

If you hadn't guessed i hate Scotty McF*cknose

It's being going on since his first season, i remember that fat c**t Martin Samuels referring to him as some sort of bank manager, and don't forget the "worst Liverpool team for 50 years" quote from Alan Hansen after Burnley and Southampton.

Liverpool box clever following European checkmate

Martin Kelner The Guardian

Liverpool's counterpunch left Sky on the back foot after the pay-TV firm prepared to feast on Rafa Benítez's corpse

It comes to something when Andy Gray is the voice of sweet reason. But that was his role in Sky's post-match analysis/blood lust after Liverpool's pyrrhic victory in Budapest. As the curtain fell on the Reds' Champions League season, presenter Richard Keys clearly sensed vultures shuffling into their dinner jackets, giving their shoes a last-minute shine, ready to feast on the twitching corpse of Rafa Benítez, and was not about to be diverted from this scenario.

Geoff Shreeves, Sky's man below stairs with the hand-held microphone, was dispatched to witness the ravaging but sadly for Shreeves no one seemed inclined to tuck in, least of all Liverpool's suave managing director Christian Purslow.

Purslow strikes one as the sort of chap for whom the word "urbane" was invented, someone who would know exactly how to send back a bottle of Chablis Premier Cru if it were not up to snuff. I imagine if several close family members were to be wiped out by a meteor falling to earth, you might catch him with his tie slightly askew but elimination from the Champions League appeared to leave him neither shaken nor much stirred.

"What are the financial ramifications?" Shreeves asked him. "Limited actually, Geoff," was the unruffled response. "If we play two or three games in the Europa League, it should be financially neutral," which seemed to contradict the conventional wisdom but did not stop Shreeves from cutting to the chase: "In terms of the manager's position, though, would it have been a minimum requirement that you reach the knockout stages?" "We don't run our business in that respect," said Purslow patiently. "We don't make managerial and strategic decisions around results in the short run. You can never predict last-minute goals. Two goals have cost us dear in the Champions League and that's no basis on which to make managerial decisions."

"So going out of the Champions League at this stage, would that not induce the owners to review the manager's position at the moment?" countered Sky's rottweiler, with his teeth firmly clamped on the manager's position. "Absolutely not," said Purslow, leaving Shreeves with no option but – with apologies to Quentin Tarrantino – to get hypothetical on his ass: "What about this season, though, if Rafa Benítez was unable to finish in the top four and qualify for the Champions League next season?"

"Rafa has just signed a new five-year contract, we're about four months into it. He has signed up and we are very happy he has done so."

Keys somehow found equivocation in this and the return to the studio found him with furrowed brow. "Does that leave us with some doubt whether he will be there in six months' time or not?" he asked his pundits. "What's he saying?" "I think he is saying he will be there in six months' time," deconstructed Gray. "That's the impression I got from the interview."

Purslow's interview made for an interesting contrast with the press conference from Portsmouth announcing Avram Grant's assumption of managerial duties, broadcast live on Sky Sports News. The chief executive Peter Storrie, acknowledging Paul Hart's achievements in difficult circumstances, said: "Unfortunately, this is a results industry," which is something he might want to discuss with his counterpart on Merseyside.

It was a relief to turn to the less opaque business of chess boxing. As hybrid sports go, it is a peach. Could they have picked two less compatible disciplines to combine? For a start, how are you expected to pick up the chess pieces wearing boxing gloves? And what if you are concentrating on the chess game and someone wallops you in the middle of your Benko's Opening?

Fortunately, these and other questions were answered in a typically thorough Transworld Sport feature. The sport is the invention of a Serbian cartoonist Enki Bilal, who used it as a plot device in his graphic novel, The Cold Equator. A Dutch fan of the book, Iepe Rubingh, started organising real matches and now there are 150 professional competitors.

A match comprises alternating rounds of boxing and 12-minute chess sessions, with a short pause between rounds for the guys to take off their gloves, spit in a bucket and possibly receive confusing advice like, "He's leaving his bishop exposed, keep jabbing away." As far as I know it is the only sport you can win by knockout or checkmate.

In the tournament from Berlin shown on the programme, Nikolai Sazhin, a 19-year-old Siberian neo-physicist beat German Frank Stoldt, an experienced riot cop, described as the "godfather of chess boxing".

"It is extremely challenging," says Sazhin. "The chess part is even harder than real chess. You come out of the ring, your heart's racing, you are still breathing heavily and suddenly you have to calm yourself down," which I guess is how Rafa feels when he walks off after a match and finds Shreeves in the tunnel.


http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2009/nov/30/screen-break-liverpool-champions-league

I agree with the witch-hunt theory - most journalists seem to really dislike Rafa.
I don't really understand it because he always appears to me to be humble and dignified in his dealings with the media.
Contrast this with the bullishness of 'Sir Furious' and the arrogance of Mourinho and you've got to conclude that Benitez (and Wenger to a lesser extent) are easy targets for fleet street.
However - at the same time, Sir Alex got a lot of stick in the early Mourinho period so maybe we should just accept that it comes with the territory

It's simple all these journalist are jealous of Rafa. No other manager or journal can exude wit as he does. I feel they no they can't so whenever Rafa uses his ingenious statements, they feel slightly shorter as he seems to have the upper level of intelligence.

I've started this topic in absolute frustration with the way media behaves and reacts with things concerning our club.

For over a month there was very less we heard about Managers wanting Rafa's place, Players wanting to leave, Behind the board scenes etc etc.. why?? Because our results were enough criticism for them to write..

Suddenly with two back to back victories (and clean sheets) they're at it..
Suddenly they remember masch as agreed to Barca terms, suddenly Parslow is unhappy, Klinsmann is again interested in Rafa's job with o'niell as the first option for the Americans..

I mean this is really annoying.. y don't these dumbwits find some other club to write their sh*t about?

Th only thing I want to read in the papers is how well we did in the game, where we can improve, and any potential signings or progress.
I don't care about the chairmen, I don't care if other clubs want ANY of our personnel.
Its lazy journalism, and only feeds the ' The Sun' generation, who still think that we're being invaded by Calais, that the most important people in the world have fake breasts, have a good singing voice, or used to be good at modelling.

We will, as always, turn a blind eye as WE Never Walk Alone.

Th only thing I want to read in the papers is how well we did in the game, where we can improve, and any potential signings or progress.
I don't care about the chairmen, I don't care if other clubs want ANY of our personnel.
Its lazy journalism, and only feeds the ' The Sun' generation, who still think that we're being invaded by Calais, that the most important people in the world have fake breasts, have a good singing voice, or used to be good at modelling.

We will, as always, turn a blind eye as WE Never Walk Alone.

So you're happy to read about speculation regarding other clubs players, just not your own?
Also - I'm quite happy for the media to get on the back of the owners - we need them to be feeling the pressure from all quarters

Geoff Shreeves the SKY after match interviewer is a f@cking amateur with no bollox. He would not ask Ferguson or anyone else some of the questions he throws at Rafa. In fact the whole of the SKY team are a bunch of wankers. If they didnt provide coverage of the whole F***ing league and everyhting else most wouldnt watch.

Keys / Gray / Redknapp / Shreeves can F**k off - spineless manc and chelsea loving arseholes.

When you think of the media monopoly that well known Liverpool hater Murdoch has, it's no surprise that all things associated with the city get so much stick.
Not forgetting of course that the majority of the media is now based in Mancland - Liverpool baiting is almost a national sport.
The Martin Kelner article is excellent and shows that there are one or two newspapers that paint an untarnished picture of events.

http://www.herald.ie/opinion/columnists/john-giles/besieged-benitez-can-go-fourth-from-here-1955001.html

Besieged Benitez can go fourth from here

IT was probably the moment when the commentator reeled off the list of competitions which no longer involve Liverpool that the full scale of the club's perilous circumstances hit home.

Liverpool just about did what they had to do against Debrecen but their fate was sealed in Italy, or, more accurately, against Lyon at Anfield last month.

The Champions League is the big jewel and, for the moment, it's off the menu. Waves of consequence will spread out from that cold fact but I don't think they will be seismic enough to shift him.

There is no doubt that Liverpool are in a bad place at the moment and Rafael Benitez under as much pressure as he's felt at any time in his career.

But I still think he has a card to play, and I'm betting that by the time the dust has settled in May he will have found a way to finish in fourth spot.

His strongest card has always been the support he gets from the Kop and, despite what has been said and written, I still think he has the full backing of most Liverpool fans.

SHACKLED

They still believe he has been harshly treated and could deliver the Premier League title if his hands were not shackled by circumstances.

That support will buy him enough time to get to Christmas and I would bet on him to drag Liverpool's Premier League form back to what it should be now that he's seeing the return of many of his players who were injured.

His squad has never been strong enough, although he came close last season, but it should be good enough to survive this latest crisis.

Once again fate has handed Benitez a ready-made opportunity to recharge the level of goodwill he enjoys among the fans by getting a decent result in the Merseyside derby, but this time the circumstances are definitely different.

In the past, each time pressure has risen to dangerous levels for Benitez he finds a result, and almost always after that Liverpool string a few good performances together. The most recent example came after Liverpool lost a string of games to Fiorentina, Chelsea Sunderland and then, crucially, to Lyon at home in the Champions League.

The bounce duly came when Liverpool were expected to lose against Manchester United but won. Instead of using the win over Manchester United to launch a good run Liverpool failed to get what they needed against Lyon in the reverse fixture, and in between we've seen some pretty ordinary performances and results in the Premier League, including a stinging defeat by Fulham and a scrambled draw against Birmingham City.

As a result Benitez takes his side into the derby game 13 points behind Chelsea and five points off fourth place.

It's one thing hanging on to the coattails of clubs like Manchester United, Chelsea and Arsenal in fourth place and keeping a secure grip on the path to the Champions League. It's another thing entirely to be scrapping among four of five other hungry clubs for the final Champions League spot.

It's different mindset for a start, and it can't help matters at the moment that everyone will be talking about the Europa League as if it matters for the next while and, irony of ironies, they could be playing Everton in that competition too.

In fact, when you have a look at Everton's season to date, it's probably fair to say that "The Chosen One" is under at least as much pressure as Benitez and if results don't go right for him it could be the blue half of Merseyside looking for a new manager this Christmas.

There are some similarities in the two managers' circumstances. Both saw their best players disappear during the summer and both have had major issues with injuries.

But, as I said above, Benitez has the continuing regard of the Kop and, for the moment, anger from that source is directed at two American gentleman rather than the team and manager.

I would accept that a defeat by Everton and a few more bad results to follow would create a new situation and, let's be honest, nobody can really predict how George Gillett and Tom Hicks will react to elimination from the Champions League and the possibility that there will be more pain ahead.

Benitez does have the safety blanket of a five-year contract and presumably enough clauses built in to make sure that Liverpool cannot sack him without paying through the nose.

Ultimately it will come down to the fans, and while it would be a rare thing indeed to see Liverpool fans hound a manager out, especially one who has given them the Champions League trophy.

That's why I think he will survive for the moment. With a full deck, Liverpool should be good enough to win in places like Wigan and Bolton, and unless Spurs can sustain a real challenge this season I don't see anyone with a better chance than Liverpool of finishing fourth.

I think a few of these pundits/journalists will get a shock, United are not the team they were and are going to drop points this season Arsenal have always been renowned for dropping points against teams that bully them and Chelsea may also drop a few points along the way.

Chelsea may be too big an ask for us to claw back now considering we most likely will drop some points along the way too, but I would not at all be surprised if we were to finish above both United and Arsenal & then hope we can finish above Chelsea.

Its good to see John Giles in his article above not joining in with this public character assassination of Rafa, his article seems well constructed, whilst it is hardly full of praise for Rafa it does highlight one or the two of the issues resulting in our current dilemma i.e Injuries, squad depth & the owners. Fair play to you John for keeping it real.

Speaks volumes that you see f*ck all of Purslows interview in the papers following the Debreceni result, yet we find an interview with Klinsman saying he wouldn't turn Liverpool down again.

Journalists on the whole are sh*t bags. There's only the odd few worth listening to and most of them are Kopites anyway. Tony Barrett, Brian Reade, for example.

And Klinsmann can do one too...

Its good to see John Giles in his article above not joining in with this public character assassination of Rafa, his article seems well constructed, whilst it is hardly full of praise for Rafa it does highlight one or the two of the issues resulting in our current dilemma i.e Injuries, squad depth & the owners. Fair play to you John for keeping it real.

I see alot of John on Irish TV and he's certainly not Rafa's biggest fan, but like you say at least he has the integrity to be fair to Rafa and acknowledge the fact that we have had our problems this year.