ex managers as coaches are giving yourself a stick to get beaten with. now roy keane cannot fit the top quality model but he is a knife at the back of lambert at villa who will inevitably take over. hoddle at qpr.... same. if rodgers appointed rafa and suddenly we get a clean sheet.... rafa gets credit. thats no win.
From what we know of BR, the man and the manager, it is inconceivable that he may be pondering at any level of his consciousness about bringing aboard anyone to assist him with coaching. He's got 99 thoughts on his exalted mind, but hiring a coach ain't one.
He's got a bit of bluster and rap hubris in him, doesn't he. Some of his pre-game statements can be sampled, thrown against a beat, and voila.
Rafa knows how to set a team up to keep a clean sheet. In today's PL, that would mean a lot. For those who bemoan the lack of goals from this, just take a look at where we are now and count the goals (scored and conceded)..... Question is; is he the same coach who took us to 2 CL finals? Has he lost his edge? Have to say that nearing the end of his reign, i questioned his man management capability....while he could compete with Mourinho tactically, he seemed to alienate players.....whereas Mourinho, generally has a great relationship with his top players.
What's to understand beyond what I've said? Nobody wanted him in the Prem and hardly set the world alight after leaving you either. There's nothing I've posted about him that you can dispute either so I can understand your rather empty response. You obviously like the guy for the success he brought you early on, but if you want a manager to help you succeed in the league reality bites.
Pool fans think of Rafa as a tactical genius who won them a Champions League Trophy, they seem to forget that in the final his tactical genius saw them go in 3-0 down at half time and that it was Gerrard who decided they had nothing to lose and went all attack in the second half. His tactical genius got them second place once in the Premiership, Brendan has already achieved this in 2.5 seasons. Sorry people, Rafa was a decent manager, maybe even a good manager, but nothing special.
It's a frequent source of amazement to me how fans of other clubs know more about ours than we do. It was the introduction of Hamann at half time that turned the game, tightening up the centre and freeing Gerrard to do what he did best. That was, we assume, Rafa's decision, so credit to him for changing things in time. However, imo it was a mistake not to play Hamann from the beginning, as I feel his presence may well have prevented at least one, perhaps two of the first half goals. Rafa knew how to play in Europe, surely nobody can doubt that, but I do think he struggled with the PL a bit. Whether he'd have got the hang of it with time, if spared the influence of Laurel and Hardy, can only ever be speculation.
Shall we match that by highlighting Ferguson's European record i.e he may have had some good points but was really nothing special when it came to European football
Rafa was a very good manager at one time. That's evidenced by winning the league with Valencia and getting Liverpool to a CL final, although I do agree that circumstance rather than tactical genius saw the turnaround at half time in that game. He cracked under the pressure of a title race with Fergie and hasn't been the same since. He made a fool of himself and hasn't recovered from it. That's evidenced by choking the league, finishing seventh, doing the unthinkable (desperate) in taking an interim job at Chelsea and overseeing a distinctly average tenure at Napoli. I hope Brendan stays at Liverpool but if he does leave then I'd love to see Benitez go back.
2 European cup finals actually. he had a better 5 yrs than most managers have at clubs, inc fergie. plus he had ****s of owners to deal with, but you lot already know this bollocks so whats the fecking point!
You have to put that 5 years comment into context. Fergie took over a club that was hovering above relegation, in a competitive league that didn't benefit from the luxury of 4 champions league places.
While it might be tough to accept from Diego and Tobes, I fully agree with their sentiment. I for one was glad that we got rid of Rafa and felt that we had stagnated under his leadership. He was a master tactician for one-off games, but never anything special over lengthy periods of time. To him, adventurous was playing with attacking fullbacks. 4-5-1 every time. He got us some great moments but that final season was awful and showed his stubbornness. He would entrench himself in tactics and refuse to change for an entire season. Rodgers does it too but he changes after 10 games. F or me the most idiotic thing he did was the Keane saga, where he persisted with Robbie while he was ****, then when he started to bang them in, sold him at a loss. Aquilani, Dossena, Pennant. Morientes. Babel. For me he proved that he was very hit and miss and if it were my money I'd be slow to trust him with it. Sure H&G held him back. But many times he held himself back. And in his final season he held us back. He was content with a draw. He'd take off players on hat tricks to prevent them from developing an ego. He'd set out to contain the likes of West Brom defensively instead of unleashing the best midfield in the world. I loved him, I enjoyed his time here. But it was time for him to go. Rodgers took a worse squad, revamped it, and came closer to the title than Rafa ever did. It took him 2 seasons. Is Rodgers the right man for the long term stability of the club? I don't know but I'm willing to give him a chance. He needs to become more proactive in changing things that don't work though.
