Wasn't sure if this should have gone in the Ronnie Whelan thread or not but anyway, a relatively sensible read in today's Telegraph.
Liverpool's Rafa Benitez should be criticised for what he does, not what he doesn't
Rory Smith, The Daily Telegraph
Ronnie Whelan, it is fair to say, is not an ardent supporter of Rafael Benitez, the Liverpool manager who is coming to define the word beleaguered.
Speaking on RTE Sport in the aftermath of Liverpool’s chaotic collapse at Fulham, Whelan launched what is known in the business as a blistering tirade at the Spaniard, detailing his desire to win the European Cup “so he can get a job anywhere in Europe,” insisting that his “days have got to be numbered” at Anfield and declaring that his team selection at Fulham proves that Benitez is, once more, “putting all his eggs in one basket.”
Stirring stuff. Wrong, of course, quite wrong. Mainly because Benitez’s team selection at Craven Cottage – the inclusion of Sotiris Kyrgiakos, Philipp Degen and Andriy Voronin the most eye-watering for any Liverpool fan – was defined not by a desire to rest players for the Champions League clash with Lyon on Wednesday, a game Liverpool must win to retain any real hope of reaching the lucrative knock-out rounds, but by injury.
That’s right, Ronnie. Glen Johnson, injured. Martin Skrtel, injured. Daniel Agger and Alberto Aquilani, ill. Fabio Aurelio, injured. Steven Gerrard, injured. Martin Kelly, Nabil El Zhar and David N’Gog, three players who would all have played because of their absent senior counterparts, all injured. Even reserve goalkeeper Diego Cavalieri, injured. Fernando Torres, not fully fit.
Yet the accusations that Benitez (did you know he’s foreign, by the way? He’s not from here, so he doesn’t understand English football. In Spain, they hate winning the domestic league. In fact, the only domestic league that matters is the English domestic league. All the others are just held because there’s not much to do in the bits of the world that aren’t here on a Saturday) does not value the Premier League as much as the Champions League is all too easy to level in his direction because, well, for several years it was true.
Not that Benitez would have dismissed the opportunity to win the Premier League, obviously, just that he knew his side, with resources scant by the gluttonous standards of Manchester United and Chelsea, were better equipped to deal with the intricate skirmishes offered by a 13-game competition than a 38-game one.
So, to an extent, he prioritised the tournament he thought he could win, knowing full well Liverpool were capable of finishing in the Champions League slots domestically but not likely, with a side of £6 million players in a league won by £20 million ones, to stay the course at the top.
He did win it, of course, in the most remarkable final, the most remarkable upset, in the recent history of European competition. Dortmund beating Juventus in 1997 comes close, perhaps, but that aside nothing quite so strange has happened since Nigel Spink and Aston Villa overcame the mighty Bayern Munich in 1982. That Istanbul, the miracle thereof, has been forgotten so easily, as though it were a mere fevered dream, as though it was so unlikely a triumph that it could not possibly have happened, speaks volumes about modern football fans.
That, though, is a different story for a different day, probably one when Alan Curbishley is announced as Benitez’s successor by Tom Hicks, George Gillett and whichever unfortunate they bring in to give them the money they claimed they had – another dream, another fever – on the same day that Fernando Torres moves to Inter Milan, Javier Mascherano to Barcelona and Steven Gerrard to Real Madrid and £130 million goes straight into the hands of RBS Liverpool’s coffers.
If anything, Benitez has, this season, gone too far the other way, and his priority is domestic pre-eminence. Liverpool’s travails in Europe – though they ran into a side in inspired form in Florence and did not, in truth, deserve to lose to Lyon, a game in which a draw would have been an eminently fair result – can be largely attached to the fact that Benitez has built a side designed, purely and simply, to swat aside the lesser lights of the Premier League. He wanted, this season, to avoid the draws that cost Liverpool so dear last time around. He has, at least, achieved that, though it will come as no consolation as he looks around the wreckage of what was supposed to be his defining season in England.
Whelan’s critique, though, is apt in its lack of substance. Much of what is thrown at Benitez is based on prejudice and supposition. The obvious example – zonal marking, a practise employed throughout the game, throughout England (what do you think putting a man on the post is?) – comes up whenever Liverpool concede a goal from a set-piece. Yet, as Benitez rightly points out, he could compile a DVD of dozens, hundreds of goals conceded while man-marking. Neither system is flawless, both are susceptible to quality delivery and both rely on defenders attacking the aerial ball. A manager can do little if, as has been the case at Anfield all too often this season, his defenders choose not to.
Similarly, the idea that Benitez’s sides are too cautious is wheeled out by the lazy pundit whenever a convenient stick is needed to beat a manager who has never been truly understood in this country is needed. It has a vague basis in fact, but such a stark analysis is overly simplistic.
Likewise, his love of unnecessary tinkering. Or the most recent addition to the critic’s canon, that Benitez is too devoted to his 4-2-3-1 system, that he will not change it. When he does start to change it, of course, expect a barrage of abuse about his tactical befuddlement.
That is not to say Benitez is above reproach, that he has not made mistakes. He must be held accountable for the inexplicable lack of quality in depth beyond Liverpool’s first 15 or 16 players, financial restrictions or no. His man-management approach may be too inflexible in light of some of the complicated characters who call the Anfield dressing room home. The buck stops with the manager, of course, and he must, above all, take responsibility for Liverpool’s imploding campaign. There are enough genuine concerns, genuine issues with which to take him to task. Inventing new ones, Ronnie, or choosing hackneyed old complaints resurrected from seasons past is not necessary.
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/sport/rorysmith/100003028/criticise-benitez-for-what-he-does-not-what-he-doesnt/
