Probably the best article I have read about Rafa Benitez

[Benitaur]

So what your saying is it wasn't rafas fault when we needed a striker he bought Keane for £20m, when we needed a leftback he bought a shit fat one in Dossena for £8m, an injured average midfielder for £18m, and £18m on an average rightback, ok I see.

 

What I do see is a manager who is forced to buy not his first choices, but second or third or maybe further down the bin choices, and hoping to upgrade sometime in the future. At the same time, while this is happening, he is forced to make a profit by wheeling and dealing.

 

Show me where the Keane money went to after reselling him?

 

Who would you have recommended as left back at that time, and is doing so fantastically well now?

 

When Alonso was sold for 30 mil, who would you have bought as a CM?

 

Name me a better attacking right back, considering we missed out on Alves years before that, and there is no way we are getting Maicon or Alves?

[Benitaur]

Net spend or not net spend.

 

The fact is that Rafa spent more than £200M on players in his time here and if he had not wasted around £100M of that on pure dogshite he probably would still have been here and we might even have won something during the last 4 years.

 

The end.

 

One more thing by the way.

 

Wanting to get rid of Alonso for around £15M one summer and then finally have to sell him the summer after for £30M might look good for the net spenders, but for anyone else it is a proof of poor judgement that could easily be seen as a liability when it comes to how he used the clubs assetts.

 

Net spending is a logical argument when you don't have a budget and are forced to buy cheaper options in hopes of upgrading season by season, which we are. It is not a good argument if you have an unlimited budget like Chelsea or City

 

As for the Alonso saga:

 

Rafa stated that he wanted to keep Alonso AND buy Barry for the left midfield

Barry said he didn't want to join Liverpool because he wanted to play in the middle, not the left

Alonso stated when he left that the tax changes in England were unattractive

 

Make your own conclusions based on what is actually said, not newspaper headlines with no quotes

[Il Fenomeno]

How is Glen Johnson average?

 

What the fuck.

[Guest PurpleNose]

This has gone well.

[Trucker Paddy]

 

What I do see is a manager who is forced to buy not his first choices, but second or third or maybe further down the bin choices, and hoping to upgrade sometime in the future. At the same time, while this is happening, he is forced to make a profit by wheeling and dealing.

 

Show me where the Keane money went to after reselling him?

 

Who would you have recommended as left back at that time, and is doing so fantastically well now?

 

When Alonso was sold for 30 mil, who would you have bought as a CM?

 

Name me a better attacking right back, considering we missed out on Alves years before that, and there is no way we are getting Maicon or Alves?

 

How is that justification for completly fuckin up every major deal over 2 summers?

We paid more for aqualani than Snijder went for.

Who was his first choice when he blew £8m on a fat Italian fullback?

Who was 1st choice when he bought keane? We spent £20m on a shit player, it cannot be justified and it proved he was losing it

[RobbieOR]

So what your saying is it wasn't rafas fault when we needed a striker he bought Keane for £20m, when we needed a leftback he bought a shit fat one in Dossena for £8m, an injured average midfielder for £18m, and £18m on an average rightback, ok I see.

 

We didnt spend 18 million on Johnson. They still owed us money from Crouch.

[goatboy59]

It's like a TLW Greatest Hits.

[Cantrell20]

How is that justification for completly fuckin up every major deal over 2 summers?

We paid more for aqualani than Snijder went for.

Who was his first choice when he blew £8m on a fat Italian fullback?

Who was 1st choice when he bought keane? We spent £20m on a shit player, it cannot be justified and it proved he was losing it

 

We also paid more for Lucas than Arsenal did for Denilson, Diaby and Alex Song put together, I leave it to your judgement what seems more pointless:)

 

We paid more for Alberto than Inter did for Sneijder, but we had no chance of grabbing his signature, as his heart was set on current champions then, only Bayern and Inter were in the bracket. And he didn't cost 20m pounds as many point out, but 17.4 paid in several installments. He is unconventional extremely gifted player, to this day recognised as the biggest talent to attend Roma academy since Totti, but not the best buy at the time. Gourcuff, Hamsik, Bastos, Lucho Gonzalez, Manuel Fernandes or Banega then would be either better or cheape buys. To be fair to Aquilani, he never got a chance he deserved, we only saw glimpses of him, several sparks of genius and lovely back-heels. But he was the best assistant in top 5 leagues in Europe in terms of assists per minutes ratio, so should be given a chance, while Joe Cole shouldn't be a fixture from day one. Aquilani is definitely a wonderful footballer, but wasn't the best of buys, when our thin squad needed stability to push for the title, not starting from scratch.

 

Keane was a poor buy, the poorest of Rafa buys in his tenure and there's no excuse for this one. If we got the money back to invest, not straight to G&H pockets, we may look differently at it now, but Keane shouldn't grace Everton grass now, never mind Liverpool.

 

What many fail to notice are decent cut-price deals done by Rafa. He didn't spend wisely at the end, but on the other hand invested well in cheap players. Kyrgiakos, Maxi Rodriguez, David N'Gog, Milan Jovanovic are all decent buys, which cost us 3 million quids! And a bunch of young players, including Suso, Toni Brito Silva, Raheem Sterling, Nicola Saric, Sokolik, Emmlysson (scored an away winner on his debut against Mancs:)), Chris Mavinga and at least he had a hand in signing up Jonjo Shelvey and especially Danny Wilson, who hesitated over the move after Rafa departure according to Scottich press.

 

Rafa did himself no favours at the end and overpaid on some players or bought talented ones, when they weren't a first need (Johnno, Aquilani). TBF to him, he was promised cash to splash, so he would prioritise different positions if he knew what was going on, but Keane was a poor buy full stop, while Aquilani was a luxury purchase because of his injuries, not lack of class, which he has in abundance. While many of his big buys failed, his cheaper ones paid off. They were good, nothing more, nothing less. But that's the sign of time, when that's all we can afford, is it a coincidence we went downhill when we started to make profit in the transfer market, apart from 2008-2009?

[shaunstrudwick]

Benitez is a cunt

[goatboy59]

[Trucker Paddy]

 

We didnt spend 18 million on Johnson. They still owed us money from Crouch.

 

Did we get him free? No the fact we were owed money is nothing to do with the decision to buy him.

My point is every transfer that Rafa has spent anything over £5m since Torres and Yossi has been poor and in some cases shockingly stupid Keane and Aqualani been undefendable, that and given the strength of the squad he finished the 2006 season with to fail to win a trophy in that time accumulating with finishing 7th place last season any manager at any club deserves to lose his job

[Cantrell20]

So what your saying is it wasn't rafas fault when we needed a striker he bought Keane for £20m, when we needed a leftback he bought a shit fat one in Dossena for £8m, an injured average midfielder for £18m, and £18m on an average rightback, ok I see.

 

Dossena cost somewhere near to 7 million pounds, probably the deal was structured too, so we might not even pay all the money quoted. We could have got cut-price Marcel Jensen then, versatile Ujfalusi for free or Capdevila on a free transfer a year earlier. He was a poor acquisition, not suited to the EPL, but overall a gifted player, who should never leave Peninsula except for Europe League away games.

 

How is Aquilani average, I have no idea and don't fancy entering any discussion with you over the lad as you don't seem fair-minded in your judgements. Same average as Arbeloa, Sissoko, Benayoun, who left for Real Madrid, Juventus and Chelsea? Juve didn't want Aquilani for no reason, despite only one full season in Serie A, 2005-2006, when he still wasn't a regular in starting eleven, his stock remains high. He's not average, he's got the best assists per minutes on the pitch ratio in top 5 leagues in Europe. In the second part of the season was among our best players and had several very good games, Fulham, Pompey, Atletico.

 

I can understand frustration with Aquilani, but the one with Johnno is beyond me. He is easily the best British right back and probably the best in the league, on the par with injury-prone Bosingwa. If he's average, name me 10 better in the world than him. He is among top 5-6 now. In the world football.

[Trucker Paddy]

 

Dossena cost somewhere near to 7 million pounds, probably the deal was structured too, so we might not even pay all the money quoted. We could have got cut-price Marcel Jensen then, versatile Ujfalusi for free or Capdevila on a free transfer a year earlier. He was a poor acquisition, not suited to the EPL, but overall a gifted player, who should never leave Peninsula except for Europe League away games.

 

How is Aquilani average, I have no idea and don't fancy entering any discussion with you over the lad as you don't seem fair-minded in your judgements. Same average as Arbeloa, Sissoko, Benayoun, who left for Real Madrid, Juventus and Chelsea? Juve didn't want Aquilani for no reason, despite only one full season in Serie A, 2005-2006, when he still wasn't a regular in starting eleven, his stock remains high. He's not average, he's got the best assists per minutes on the pitch ratio in top 5 leagues in Europe. In the second part of the season was among our best players and had several very good games, Fulham, Pompey, Atletico.

 

I can understand frustration with Aquilani, but the one with Johnno is beyond me. He is easily the best British right back and probably the best in the league, on the par with injury-prone Bosingwa. If he's average, name me 10 better in the world than him. He is among top 5-6 now. In the world football.

 

Johnson cannot defend and those aqalani stats are a joke, 3 were against burnley and even that is questionable

[goatboy59]

He's not average, he's got the best assists per minutes on the pitch ratio in top 5 leagues in Europe.

 

[Code]

 

I can understand frustration with Aquilani, but the one with Johnno is beyond me. He is easily the best British right back and probably the best in the league, on the par with injury-prone Bosingwa. If he's average, name me 10 better in the world than him. He is among top 5-6 now. In the world football.

 

Hahaha of course he is.

[Cantrell20]

Hahaha of course he is.

 

Once again, name me 10 better and he still will be above-average. If we come up with 30-40 better, he will be mediocre. He tends to be a defensive liability, but going forward he's aesily the best right-back in the league, on the par with Evra, with much better finish. Evra is better in the in defence, but also commits many mistakes, not highlighted like Johnno's. He is more experienced and with age defensive capabilities improve, so I can easily imagine Johnson playing at Evra level in from now, so in his prime, 26-30. He was the best right back in the league in 2008-2009 and if we stayed fit for the whole season he could break into the Team of the Year. He scored 3 goals and got 4-5 assists. Not bad playing 21 games in the year.

[dave u]

Alonso stated when he left that the tax changes in England were unattractive

 

He said:

 

"Some people mentioned the more attractive tax laws in Spain compared to England as a reason for me coming back, but that's not something I ever thought about. The rewards here are not so different to what I could have earned in England and I would never have considered this an important factor."

[Original202]

We didnt spend 18 million on Johnson. They still owed us money from Crouch.

 

We did spend £18m on him.

 

Lets say I sell you a tv for £100. But I owe you £20, so you just give me £80 for the tv. You've still paid £100 for it because you're not going to get the £20 from me are you?

 

 

As for the Alonso saga:

 

Rafa stated that he wanted to keep Alonso AND buy Barry for the left midfield

Barry said he didn't want to join Liverpool because he wanted to play in the middle, not the left

Alonso stated when he left that the tax changes in England were unattractive

 

Make your own conclusions based on what is actually said, not newspaper headlines with no quotes

 

Really?

 

Benitez said: "What happened in the summer with Alonso is just football, and you always have to try to change things.

 

"Maybe I will now tell half a dozen players that I may sell them, maybe they will all start to play as well as Xabi!

 

"It doesn't matter whether I change my mind about something or the player changes his mind. What matters is that as a manager if I have a good player, a good professional, I will use that player for the benefit of the team.

 

"He is our player and we will try to take the best from him."

 

Benitez added: "He is showing the quality we know he has. Always he is a good professional, a good player.

 

"Just like Peter Crouch, who we sold to Portsmoith, people must not forget that these were players I wanted to sign, and did sign. They are good players.

 

"We did not sell Xabi in the summer because the price was not good enough for such a talented player.

 

"That is simple, this is a football market, and now he is showing character and we have a very positive situation with competition for every place in the side being very high.

 

"Alonso and Barry are two different issues. Barry is still a very good player, a fantastic player. As is Alonso.

 

"Now Alonso is playing well and the team are playing well, that applies to everyone from Steven Gerrard to Daniel Agger."

[Whelan]

[VladimirIlyich]

He was a top manager who brought our club deserved success but then put his faith in poor quality players and ultimately paid the price by losing his job.

 

Who?

Take your pick because these sentiments apply to both Rafa and Houllier.

[The Guest]

Net spending is a logical argument when you don't have a budget and are forced to buy cheaper options in hopes of upgrading season by season, which we are. It is not a good argument if you have an unlimited budget like Chelsea or City

 

As for the Alonso saga:

 

Rafa stated that he wanted to keep Alonso AND buy Barry for the left midfield

Barry said he didn't want to join Liverpool because he wanted to play in the middle, not the left

Alonso stated when he left that the tax changes in England were unattractive

 

Make your own conclusions based on what is actually said, not newspaper headlines with no quotes

 

What a load of nonsense.

 

You have been ripped apart by the lads posting quotes above anyway but playing Gareth Barry on the left of midfield would have almost been as bad as selling Alonso to play him in the middle.

 

Where are all of your quotes anyway? As far I was aware Gareth Barry put in a transfer request to move here, had murder with O'Neill which got him banned from training.and was in the press at the time saying he wanted to leave Villa to go to Liverpool. You seem to be basing your opinion on myths doing the rounds on websites not quotes as you put it.

 

Rafa didn't do as bad as some people make out in the transfer market. It was his horrendous misuse of his transfers that was his downfall. The Alonso saga though, was completely of Rafa's own making and people shouldn't try and cover it up with the same bollocks you have just tried to with.

[Cantrell20]

Johnson cannot defend and those aqalani stats are a joke, 3 were against burnley and even that is questionable

 

We won the League Cup against Birmingham and UEFA CUP against Alaves, quality of both teams was also very questionable at this level. We were extremely lucky, just like Aquilani vs Burnley. Does it mean we didn't win it?

 

Johnson is an average defender with unbelieveable attacking quality. Full stop.

[Trucker Paddy]

 

We won the League Cup against Birmingham and UEFA CUP against Alaves, quality of both teams was also very questionable at this level. We were extremely lucky, just like Aquilani vs Burnley. Does it mean we didn't win it?

 

Johnson is an average defender with unbelieveable attacking quality. Full stop.

 

I'd probably agree with that assesment of Johnson in fairness but I don't think he's been value for money in his time here

[VladimirIlyich]

Theres a place for Johnson at the club but im not sure its at right back.

[Guest PurpleNose]

Very few English players ever are value for money.