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Posts Tagged ‘rafael-benitez’

• Manager’s exit ‘a sad moment for Liverpool’
• Goalkeeper hopes ‘crisis passes’

The Liverpool goalkeeper, José Reina, has admitted he was surprised and disappointed by the news of Rafael Benítez’s departure from the club.

Benítez agreed a deal on Thursday afternoon to leave Anfield by mutual consent after six years in charge following a difficult season in which the Reds finished seventh in the Premier League.

Reina has spent the past five years with Benítez at Liverpool and feels it is a sad day for the club.

“It’s a sad moment for Liverpool, for Rafa Beneitez and for the players who have been with him,” the Spain goalkeeper said following his country’s 1-0 victory over South Korea in a World Cup warm-up game in Innsbruck.

“He was a very important person for the club for six years. Liverpool grew with him and Rafa also grew thanks to Liverpool.

“I hope that this crisis passes. That a person so important for the club as Rafa Benítez has left is news that you never would have expected and that you never would have believed,” he added. “The only thing left for me is to thank him for his confidence during all this time. I wish him the best of luck.”

LiverpoolRafael Benítezguardian.co.uk

• Kenny Dalglish heads search for new manager
• Inter may follow up initial interest in Spaniard

Kenny Dalglish is to lead the search for Rafael Benítez’s successor as Liverpool manager, with Roy Hodgson and Martin O’Neill among the frontrunners.

Benítez accepted a severance payoff worth a maximum £6m from Liverpool’s co-owners, Tom Hicks and George Gillett, today, to end a six-year reign that polarised opinion at Anfield.

Dalglish, the revered former Liverpool player and manager and now club ambassador, will assist the managing director, Christian Purslow, in the pursuit of a manager who can restore Liverpool’s Champions League status on a limited budget and convince leading players such as Steven Gerrard, Fernando Torres and Javier Mascherano not to quit Anfield.

Despite the uncertainty surrounding Liverpool over players and the future ownership of the club, with Hicks and Gillett struggling to find a buyer willing to meet their £600m-£800m price, Anfield officials insist they will not rush a decision and can install a long-term appointment.

• Benítez confirms departure from Anfield
• Andy Hunter: politics caused manager’s downfall
• In pictures: Highs and lows of Rafa’s reign
• Five challenges facing next Liverpool manager

The leading candidate at present is Hodgson, who has many admirers at Anfield with his European pedigree and recent success at Fulham. The 62-year-old former Internazionale, Switzerland and Blackburn Rovers manager is on a 12-month rolling contract at Craven Cottage and Liverpool are confident he would be receptive to their advances, despite insisting he was fully committed to Fulham after last month’s Europa League final defeat to Atlético Madrid.

Another Premier League manager under consideration is O’Neill, although any approach to Aston Villa would be fraught with complications for Liverpool. The Villa owner, Randy Lerner, recently announced the 58-year-old would not be leaving the club for Anfield or any other destination this summer and the Midlanders’ stance has not altered. The Villa board is also believed to be confident that problems on and off the field at Liverpool would dissuade O’Neill from starting anew on Merseyside.

Dalglish himself has also been mooted as a possible interim appointment, 19 years after the stresses of the job prompted his departure as Liverpool manager, but it is understood moves for Hodgson and O’Neill take precedence over what would be a remarkable return for the Scot.

Benítez’s departure was confirmed this afternoon following a further round of talks between Liverpool directors and the Spaniard’s agent, Manuel García Quilón. The position of the former Valencia and now Liverpool manager was made untenable yesterday when, following negotiations between Benítez and the new club chairman, Martin Broughton, the Anfield board offered him a compromise fee of £3m to leave with immediate effect.

Under the terms of the five-year contract signed only last March, Benítez would have been entitled to £16m if sacked by Liverpool this summer. Instead, he agreed to go with an initial £3m severance payment plus the guarantee of a further £3m spread over future dates. It is unknown whether the outspoken critic of the financial restrictions in place at Anfield has signed a confidentiality clause as part of the deal, but Benítez is now free to take a job without Liverpool demanding a compensation fee.

Benítez, an adversary of José Mourinho during their time in the Premier League, could replace the new Real Madrid coach at Internazionale. The president of the reigning European champions, Massimo Moratti, today insisted: “There is nothing new to add at this stage.” An Inter director, Gabriele Oriali, however, admitted Benítez is under consideration. “Benítez has a certain affinity with Inter fans. He is very appealing to us,” Oriali said. “He has already given us great joy, namely the 2005 Champions League win against Milan. Who does not remember Istanbul? We like him a lot. But the decision will be made by our president, Massimo Moratti.”

Liverpool insist there is no timescale on the process to install a replacement for Benítez, and chairman Broughton claimed the decision to dispense with the European Cup winning coach stemmed from the disappointments of last season. “Rafa will forever be part of Liverpool folklore after bringing home the Champions League following the epic final in Istanbul,” he said, “but after a disappointing season both parties felt a fresh start would be best for all concerned.”

News of Benítez’s departure, officially “by mutual consent”, provoked an angry protest outside Anfield tonight, where hundreds of Liverpool supporters voiced their support for their former manager and outrage at the ownership of Hicks and Gillett.

Benítez, who is on holiday in Sardinia, said: “It is very sad for me to announce that I will no longer be manager of Liverpool FC. I would like to thank all of the staff and players for their efforts. I’ll always keep in my heart the good times I’ve had here, the strong and loyal support of the fans in the tough times and the love from Liverpool. I have no words to thank you enough for all these years and I am very proud to say that I was your manager. Thank you so much once more and always remember: You’ll never walk alone.”

LiverpoolRoy HodgsonRafael BenítezAndy Hunterguardian.co.uk

Benítez was the victim of Liverpool’s financial problems but flawed signings made him partly responsible for his exit

Were it simply a football decision, a detached analysis of where Liverpool should be in the midst of a debt-ridden power vacuum, then Rafael Benítez, for the many faults, facts and suspect full-backs, would not be leaving Anfield with a lucrative pay-off. But it is not simply football that has done for Benítez.

It is the politicking that is as much a feature of the Spaniard’s managerial career as European expertise and the misfortune to fall into the employ of Tom Hicks and George Gillett. The leverage buy-out experts promised a spade in the ground for a new stadium within 60 days of their arrival in February 2007 but have only dug the hole into which Benítez has now fallen. He moved closer to the exit with every refinancing deal the Americans secured while his reputation inevitably suffered with every transfer window without additional funds. Not that Benítez walks away blameless.

In announcing the end of the manager’s six-year reign Martin Broughton, the chairman parachuted into Liverpool from British Airways to lend gravitas to the sale of the club, and who could not attend the final home game of last season due to his Chelsea allegiances, stresses that football was behind the departure. No one would dispute Broughton’s analysis of the “disappointing season” just gone but this was one dreadful campaign following five seasons of steady progress. The man who delivered Liverpool’s fifth European Cup in such miraculous style in 2005 and the FA Cup a year later had enough goodwill left on the Kop to be allowed a shot at redemption. Circumstances inside the club, many Benítez-created, however, ensured that could never happen.

It was only November 2007 when confirmation of an approach to Jürgen Klinsmann from Hicks and Gillett brought Liverpool supporters on to the streets in support of the former Valencia coach. On the back of two Champions League finals in three seasons, FA Cup success and the astute purchases of Fernando Torres, Javier Mascherano and José Reina, Benítez was untouchable in Anfield eyes. An Indian sign over José Mourinho’s Chelsea in Europe didn’t damage his cause either. His own discontent with the inner-workings of a club without the stadiums or resources of their main Premier League rivals was already surfacing, however.

The morning after defeat to Milan in the 2007 Champions League final brought the first evidence of Benítez the agitator in Liverpool colours. He left Valencia owing to boardroom interference and transfer restrictions, famously stating: “I asked for a table and they brought me a lampshade.” He had earlier fallen out with Jorge Valdano at Real Madrid over his input into the youth team. Now he was voicing frustrations inside Anfield. Prevarication on transfers, an underachieving commercial operation, lack of progress with a new stadium and being pressured to keep pace with clubs who could afford to make £20m mistakes on players; his protests were set to repeat until today’s exit.

Benítez’s motivations were to improve Liverpool but, having won the battle to oust Rick Parry as chief executive and also secured a lucrative five-year contract with no release clause that also ceded to him control of an unproductive youth academy, he consolidated his own authority in the process. That left him exposed should Liverpool falter, and the Americans’ financial problems combined with several expensive transfer mistakes made for a fatal concoction last season.

The now former Liverpool manager justifiably raged against having to sell players before he could buy in recent windows, particularly with his squad finally emerging as genuine title contenders in 2009. In that restricted climate, however, he erred badly in marginalising Xabi Alonso and compounded the problem by replacing him with Alberto Aquilani, a talented midfielder no doubt but not, as he recovered from ankle surgery, the player needed to enhance Liverpool’s title credentials.

Starved of funds but not, until now, the will to fight, Benítez refused to be silenced on the financial problems, and relationships with the boardroom continued to fracture until the point where he had little support above him. Liverpool could not start next season with the same dysfunctional power structure in place and, with no sign of Hicks and Gillett selling up, the manager became increasingly isolated.

The value of today’s Liverpool squad is vastly superior to the one Benítez inherited in 2004 and may be the commodity that has prevented the Royal Bank of Scotland taking more drastic action against Hicks and Gillett. Perversely, however, Benítez inherited a Champions League team from Gérard Houllier and a ticket to his finest hour, the victory that guarantees allegiance among many supporters to this day, in Istanbul the following May. His successor is bequeathed a pass to the Europa League and a team that could struggle to emulate last season’s seventh place finish should Steven Gerrard and Torres decide they have witnessed enough false promises and turn the Anfield exit into a revolving door.

Before Benítez bit the bullet there were reports the Liverpool board were forced to act by a threatened dressing-room revolt should the manager stay. Gerrard, Torres and others, so the line goes, have questioned Benítez’s management following the last, miserable season. Who hasn’t? What is more pertinent to the futures of Liverpool’s finest players – many of whom are aggrieved their names have been dragged into the argument – is the direction the club is taking and its ability to strengthen the squad to compete for the top honours once again.

These were the very same assurances that Benítez wanted to hear in his recent meetings with Broughton. Unable to grant them, due to the on-going uncertainty at the top of the club, the Liverpool chairman was left facing a manager disillusioned with financial constraints, in dispute with most of the Anfield hierarchy and accepting that something had to give. That it was him, and not the American co-owners who are the root cause of Liverpool’s implosion, will be a source of immense pain for Benítez.

Rafael BenítezLiverpoolAndy Hunterguardian.co.uk