http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/columnists/reade/2008/04/12/3-games-when-wenger-myths-were-exposed-89520-20380458/About time someone spoke out in his favour 
Arsene Wenger reckoned those three games with Liverpool would produce a moment of truth for his team.
But when the truth was delivered he tried to swat it away with a lie. An embarrassing one at that. Blaming the referee for the 4-2 Anfield defeat was a lamentable diversionary tactic. Wenger failed in Europe once again because his squad wasn't strong enough and his leadership wasn't good enough.
A few myths were shattered in those three meetings about a team whose free-flowing football is hailed as the best in the land. Easy on the eye it undoubtedly is. But you don't win games by adding up the passes and you don't win trophies without a killer's mentality.
In the two games at the Emirates, Arsenal failed to score from open play and at Anfield Pepe Reina was hardly tested outside the two goals. Over the two European ties the Gunners threw away a leading position three times. Each time, very cheaply.
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Wenger has clearly needed to dip into his £60million war chest but refused to on the grounds it might upset the balance of a team of kids who were developing together. Another myth. Most aren't kids anymore. The average age of the starting line-up at Anfield was 25.
The Frenchman's real moment of truth will come tomorrow if he fails to beat Manchester United, meaning his trophy haul these past four years comprises one FA Cup. Benitez can match his FA Cup over the same period, throw in a European Cup and possibly add a second one next month. So how come Wenger is perceived in this country as one of the great managers of modern times yet Benitez is consistently derided?
The Spaniard recently masterminded wins home and away against Italian league leaders Inter Milan. Wenger beat their ageing Milan rivals (who lie 20 points behind them) in the San Siro but failed to do so at the Emirates. Yet whose achievement had English football in raptures? Wenger's of course.
The Arsenal boss rested five first-team regulars against Liverpool last Saturday to keep them fresh for Europe. It cost them the points which probably cost him the title but no one said a peep. When Benitez did that earlier in the season he was slaughtered for being a Tinkerman.
Liverpool clawed their way back into Wednesday's game via Sami Hyypia's free header at a corner, yet no one pointed out the deficiencies of Wenger's man-to-man marking system. Whenever Liverpool concede from a set-piece, Benitez is savaged for employing zonal marking.
Maybe it's time Benitez's legion of critics within football (and Anfield) faced their own moment of truth, and admitted he is not in his third Champions League semi-final in four years because he has pact with the devil, but because he is one of the modern game's great coaches, whose only failing in top-flight management has been an inability thus far to deliver the Premier League title to Anfield.
Maybe they should accept he's been up against clubs like Chelsea and United these past four seasons, with far greater resources, and recall it took Alex Ferguson seven years to win his first title.
Maybe, now the blood is drenching the boardroom carpets, they will realise civil war has been raging at Anfield all season, and Benitez has been caught in the middle. His mental health publicly questioned, judgments undermined, spending ridiculed and forward planning sabotaged. They even admitted to actively seeking his replacement.
Yet his reserve side has just walked the northern section of the Premier Reserve League league, he stands on the brink of a Champions League Final and qualification for next season's competition. I'm sure his many critics will dismiss it as a fluke. Just like his two La Liga titles and UEFA Cup wins were at Sevilla.
What did Gary Player once say about being lucky. The more he practised the luckier he became. In the biggest club competition in the world Rafa keeps getting plenty of practice.
Maybe one day he'll get lucky, unlike Wenger, and win it. Oh . . he already has.
