Rafa to finally pen 5 year deal next week?

[The 5th Benitel]

I've already said that decision was a colossal risk.

 

It was a glaring mistake to add to all the others in the league this season.

[Barrington Womble]

I've seen players play like they don't really give a fuck at times yes, I've seen us put in 20 mins of pressure only to see them give up if they haven't scored in that time. I've seen them score and then decide the game is won only to draw and I've also seen them go behind and then decide to start playing, often too late...

 

I think the above is down to the Manager and the players though, you seem to want to pin it solely on the Manager...

 

So who signed the players? Who's job is it to motivate the players? Who's job is it to prepare the players? The buck stops with the manager - if it doesn't why have a manager? Just let the tea lady pick the team on a friday afternoon and Rashid buy the players in the summer.

[Carra_is_legend]

Yeah I do. The media are cunts, you know that and I know that. They will talk about Rafa's contract regardless of whether or not he says anything. What is telling is that this contract offer was only discovered due to Rafa letting us know.

 

Previously it was leaked he would sign within the week, prior to him receiving it. This made sure it was in the press and a hot topic. Guess who has to face the press 2-3 times a week a answer these questions while the snakes sit in the back ground.

 

Rafa has told us the score and the media the score. 2 weeks. Simple, wait and see, now lets talk about the football.

 

yes, the media are full of cunts and they get paid for doing the cunting job. It is up to the manager, players and the club to stop feeding them with information. That is why I said EVERYONE should shut the fuck up - including the manager. A simple "I won't talk about my contract until it is sorted one way or other" from the manager would have put atleast 50% of the speculation to bed. And who knows? We might have won 50% of the games we drew and could have had a table topping game tomorrow.

[Carra_is_legend]

STOP TALKING SENSE.

 

Rashid buy the players in the summer.

 

Looks like you took my advice quite literally mate. ;)

[RSM]

The correlation works over the season.

 

The Mancs lost twice to Citeh last year but won the League

 

I keep hearing that the 38-game nature of a domestic competition is why people prefer it over a knock-out competition for the whole of Europe.

 

Then they look at a game in isolation!

 

Funny as fuck.

[The 5th Benitel]

Funny as fuck.

 

 

I know. For a happy moment there i thought i'd dreamt the 5 or 6 home games where the same problems kept repeating themselves over and over.

[Guest ShoePiss]

So who signed the players? Who's job is it to motivate the players? Who's job is it to prepare the players? The buck stops with the manager - if it doesn't why have a manager? Just let the tea lady pick the team on a friday afternoon and Rashid buy the players in the summer.

 

That made me laugh, I just think that each player has ownership of the situation as well as the Manager just like in any job. I think it's too simplistic to say it's all the Manager's fault.

 

I suppose I don't want Rafa to leave for two reasons, I don't see a better replacement anywhere and also it would be yet another rebuilding phase.

 

I don't think we are currently where we were under Souness or Houllier right now. We're in a better position than that.

[Carra_is_legend]

I know. For a happy moment there i thought i'd dreamt the 5 or 6 home games where the same problems kept repeating themselves over and over.

 

Or the 10 games every single season.

[Barrington Womble]

Looks like you took my advice quite literally mate. ;)

 

I try :)

[Antynwa]

I took my bird out last night for a meal and movies.

 

I used a vouncher I had from the last time I went. She flipped out and started talking about Netspend.

 

Ungrateful bitch.

[one dude abides]

Yes, the thread I posted above gives all the figures season by season. Rafa has outspent Ferguson by about £5m since he took the job.

 

utter rubbish

[SpeedyG]

Just something new to throw into the mix. People need to get used to the fact that the press will continue to brief against Benitez until he wins the EPL. Anything and everything which can be spun against him will at some point be put out there.

 

Norcroft was on lfc.tv and gave an insight into why. Firstly, he said, they don't understand him, he thinks too much and he's doesn't stand on the sideline shouting "Get stuck in lads", losing his temper and swearing at all and sundry. He also said that unlike other managers he does not have favorites (in the print press at least) who he uses a la Redknapp to influence the way he is portrayed in the press. He treats them all the same.

[SpeedyG]

That post doesnt really do you justice.

 

You know as well as I do that no-one is saying that the correlation is 1.00 & equally no-one is saying that Stoke could win it.

 

So clearly there is a line to be drawn.

Seriously though you do need to throw the "Cēterīs paribus" thing in there. Because people here really do, I don't know why, think you are stating that there is a perfect correlation and that there are no other variables involved.

[Whelan]

It was a glaring mistake to add to all the others in the league this season.

 

NO it wasn't.

 

Everybody seems to start of at the middle and then retreat to the extremes where Rafa is concerned.

 

I don't recall ever saying that we don't have enough money to compete? We do, and to suggest we will never finish higher than third is absolute bollocks, we just don't have the margin of error that United and Chelsea have. As you can see with the furore over Keane, I dont see the same discussions taking place over Nani etc, because they are given time to settle in there is no pressure on them. FFS Fletcher is picked ahead of him now!

 

I will defend Rafa's record on signings, because I accept that all managers are going to sign shite, the most successful limit them.

I won't defend Rafa over Deggan or Voronin, needless signings that have just hampered cheaper alternatives, but Aurelio and Zenden were ideal.

And he does have to start making some more 5-10 million pound signings work, Pennant, Lucas (who I rate), Dossena have been his recent signings and don't compare to Sissoko or Garcia.

 

I don't really know where I am going with this...... but getting fed up with Liverpool fans regurgitating the same old shite, refusing to see any validity in any other arguments.

[Barrington Womble]

That made me laugh, I just think that each player has ownership of the situation as well as the Manager just like in any job. I think it's too simplistic to say it's all the Manager's fault.

 

I suppose I don't want Rafa to leave for two reasons, I don't see a better replacement anywhere and also it would be yet another rebuilding phase.

 

I don't think we are currently where we were under Souness or Houllier right now. We're in a better position than that.

 

We're certainly not where we were under Souness, but then have never been since he left the club.

 

For me the manager has to take responibility for what happens on the pitch. On more than one occasion this season he has said "if you are not playing well, then it is important not to lose". No Rafa, if you know were not playing well get off the 3 shittest players and replace them rather than making the substitions your fitness computer programme told you to do on Tuesday afternoon, change some tactics and shake it up. There just seems to be this acceptance "well we're shit today and how embarrassing would it be to lose to Stoke, fuck that, lets settle for what we have".

 

As for a better manager out there - well there lies Rafa's biggest assett, it wouldn't matter if shanks and bob combined in one super human manager was out there, would the other pair of cunts manage to find him. For the last 2 years under Houllier, the best defence of him any of the pro-Houllier briggade could do was "well who else is there" (apart from the "he nearly gave his life for this club", convienetly forgetting we weren't at war and it was actually the club who saved his life, as if he had a job like the rest of us, he'd have probably just died at his desk). Who else is there just doesn't wash it with me, as a club we should always have 3 or 4 candiates in mind at all times, in case we have a repeat of the Kenny thing, the Souness heart bypass, the Houllier heart problem, the rafa getting off to Madrid situation. We should never not be prepared.

[SpeedyG]

Which is rich coming from someone using wrong facts such as Rafa's spending, but dogmatically sticking them anyway. And when pulled on it his best attempt at justifying what he's said is to belittle the person who's facts contradict his.

 

Indeed you couldn't even do that properly as you stated:

No one has ever ridiculed his articles for being inaccurate, infact the opposite is true, in that his articles are too long and too overladen with facts.

 

Statements carry more weight when they are backed up with fact, but don't let that small detail get in the way of your attempt to make a point.

 

This won't help your case, but the irony is too good to miss out on and to be fair it's the exception that proves the rule, but that subtlety will be missed by the cro-mags I'm sure, but Tomkins had to print an amendment to the original article because it was inaccurate! He actually overstated the cost of the team, by about 30m I think. :smile:

[Guest ShoePiss]

We're certainly not where we were under Souness, but then have never been since he left the club.

 

For me the manager has to take responibility for what happens on the pitch. On more than one occasion this season he has said "if you are not playing well, then it is important not to lose". No Rafa, if you know were not playing well get off the 3 shittest players and replace them rather than making the substitions your fitness computer programme told you to do on Tuesday afternoon, change some tactics and shake it up. There just seems to be this acceptance "well we're shit today and how embarrassing would it be to lose to Stoke, fuck that, lets settle for what we have".

 

As for a better manager out there - well there lies Rafa's biggest assett, it wouldn't matter if shanks and bob combined in one super human manager was out there, would the other pair of cunts manage to find him. For the last 2 years under Houllier, the best defence of him any of the pro-Houllier briggade could do was "well who else is there" (apart from the "he nearly gave his life for this club", convienetly forgetting we weren't at war and it was actually the club who saved his life, as if he had a job like the rest of us, he'd have probably just died at his desk). Who else is there just doesn't wash it with me, as a club we should always have 3 or 4 candiates in mind at all times, in case we have a repeat of the Kenny thing, the Souness heart bypass, the Houllier heart problem, the rafa getting off to Madrid situation. We should never not be prepared.

 

That's part of my concern, I still don't think there is a better man for the job though. It's certainly not Mourinho, who in your opinion is?

[stringvest]

The problem with an over-reliance on statistics is that it's usually an early warning that it will be accompanied by an appalling analysis of non-statistical data. Certainly true of Tomkins and his acolytes.

[Whelan]

The problem with an over-reliance on statistics is that it's usually an early warning that it will be accompanied by an appalling analysis of non-statistical data. Certainly true of Tomkins and his acolytes.

 

Do have any facts to back up that theory?

[stringvest]

Do have any facts to back up that theory?

 

Yes.

[The 5th Benitel]

NO it wasn't.

 

Everybody seems to start of at the middle and then retreat to the extremes where Rafa is concerned.

 

We went into the 2nd half of our first title challenge in years having sold our 2nd best forward. That left us with our best forward who had been having injury problems all year, a forward we converted to right midfield (mainly cos he went nearly a calender year in the league without scoring), a untired 19 year old and a weak wide player who people have tried to convince themselves can play up front just cos he's quick.

 

How isn't that a mistake? They're not extremes. They're facts.

[Guest ShoePiss]

We went into the 2nd half of our first title challenge in years having sold our 2nd best forward. That left us with our best forward who had been having injury problems all year, a forward we converted to right midfield (mainly cos he went nearly a calender year in the league without scoring), a untired 19 year old and a weak wide player who people have tried to convince themselves can play up front just cos he's quick.

 

How isn't that a mistake? They're not extremes. They're facts.

 

2nd best forward who proved to be no better than Voronin, also a fact.

[Barrington Womble]

That's part of my concern, I still don't think there is a better man for the job though. It's certainly not Mourinho, who in your opinion is?

 

My worry with Mourinho is it'd be more of the same and without the extra cash he had at Chelsea, we'd be just as we are now. I wouldn't choose to swap him, but if Rafa leaves for whatever reason, I can think of worse managers the yanks could choose - but I don't think it would be a step forward, but I understand those who think it would (he's won the league everywhere he's been if he takes Inter to the league and even though he's had one advantage or another each time, that is still some achievement and his home record is just plain incredible).

 

To be honest though I think it's really difficult for us as fans to pick someone. A manager of someone else we don't quite study in the way we do our own and also we don't have the opportunity to sit down and talk to candidates. If I had the chance I would certainly like to talk to Rijkaard, I would deffo be interested in both Hiddink and Capello (although we've obviously missed the boat on both of those) and I'm sure if I put my mind to it there'd be others too. Even you look Guardiola seems to be doing a fine job at Barca, so perhaps we don't even need someone who has a track record and just someone who has the clubs vision (if that still exists with our current ownership) and a plan to deliver.

[hamstrung]

I've watched with my own eyes Rafa settling for draws against teams that are relegation candidates. Settling, because he'd sooner get a draw than risk a win, even though simple maths will tell you as it's 3 points for a win, that's fucking good odds and it's worth going for it. If you've not seen that in our play this season, you've not been watching.

 

We've done that, I agree. Generally it been away from home. And while I have been fuming at the time, they aren't the games that have cost us.

 

Its generally agreed that the draws at home have cost us, and in those its been because we haven't had the breaks (Stoke) or the wherewithal (most of the others) to break a defensive team down.

[The 5th Benitel]

2nd best forward who proved to be no better than Voronin, also a fact.

 

Voronin was never our 2nd top scorer after half a season and will never score 15 goals a season for anyone in our league. That is definately a fact.

 

Again, you give any other club in our league a choice between those two and you'd only get one answer.