I just want to take a moment to compare two teams. At the end there will be a moral of the story kind of thing..
Rafa Benitez constructed a starting 11 in 2008-09 of Reina, Arbeloa, Carragher, Agger, Aurelio, Macherano, Alonso, Kuyt, Gerrard, Riera, Torres. In the present day 4 of those claim a regular spot in the Spanish team - world beaters, despite their recent stumble against a fired up Brazil side. One is the captain of Argentina, one the captain of Denmark and one the captain of England. It was a formidable team that almost (4 pts) won the league.
Now Brendan Rodgers is at the helm and his team is less star studded. The main star - Suarez's future is in doubt and of the team mentioned above only two are guaranteed a spot in the current starting 11. (Gerrard and Agger). I don't want to compare individual abilities of each position etc but I did want to make a point that the 2008-9 team was exceptionally prestigious.
What happened was Benitez was sacked and the team he constructed fell apart. The following two seasons new teams began to take shape but then fell apart again due to sackings. Rodgers is now in the process of constructing a team that can compete in multiple competitions to a high level. The moral is - stick with the manager. A new man would only have new ideas and change what has been slowly growing. The current team is young and will develop. Liverpool will be the club where many players will make their name. Coutinho, Henderson, Sturridge have all began to flourish. In 5 or 6 years time we may look back on this years team and marvel at the stars in it. Who knows.
Mignolet
Johnson-Skrtel-Agger-Enrique
Gerrard-Lucas
Aspas-Coutinho-Sterling/Suarez
Sturridge
A nice mix of proven ability and next level claims. Hope you enjoyed this 'analysis' makes a change from the transfer talk. No one is asking for Rodgers' head (thank goodness) but you can never support your manager enough. Even if this year is disappointing it would be a mistake to sack the guy. There is serious potential in the team and Rodgers has clear direction for them.
Thanks for reading. Thus far - what do you think the strongest and most frequent starting 11 will be?
Let's make a comparison
posted on 2/7/13
comment by Suso The Magician - (U11770)
posted 2 minutes ago
and how much was the networth of them players.
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How is that relevant?
When you buy players, you have to sell some to make room for them in your squad. This happens with every football club, not just Liverpool Suso.
posted on 2/7/13
Including youth signed by Rafa to support your point Vidic. Rafa signed alot of players but when he wanted Silva he had to settle for Riera in the end. When he wanted David Villa he got Keane. When he wanted Alves he eventually got Arbeloa who turned out to be great and left with Alonso to Madrid. You cant blame H & G for everything but the buck stopped with them and they controlled everything anyway.
posted on 2/7/13
H&G were largely to blame but let's not forget Rafa had the same issues over player purchases at Valencia.
If Rafa had got all the players he wanted we would have had an amazing side, we also would have had a pretty high probability of doing a Leeds.
Our wage bill was already massive and Rafa showed no sign of wanting to control it.
Rafa is from the school of manager who leaves finance to other people but who is happy to blame other people when they can't afford what he wants.
I prefer my managers to have a bit of fiscal responsibility themselves, which is why I am happier with BR because he recognises we can't afford A-list all the time and that each player has a value.
Rafa is a very good manager of expensive players as he has shown throughout his career, but I wouldn't touch him if I was a chairman working on a budget.
posted on 2/7/13
Excellent post righteous.
posted on 2/7/13
comment by Vidicschin (U3584)
posted 3 hours, 15 minutes ago
Redinthehead
In H&G fist two years Rrafa signed 41 players.
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He didnt keep all those 41 players on the clubs books though. When finances were squeezed by H & G, Rafa had to look at bringing in players that could have been bargains rather than the near finished product.
Both Torres and Mascherano were bought with additional loans rather than from H and G's pocket. It's only then, when they became so highly leveraged that they could not get other loans that acquisitions of top players stopped.
Take Aquilani, Alonso sold for £30m.. Aquilani bought in for an initial £5m and a payment plan for the rest.
Tells its own story.
Rafa is a top manager, but had Purslow, H and G above him (all with 0 years, literally, experience in football) telling him how to do his job.
The bloke had no chance, had the rug pulled from under him.
posted on 2/7/13
If Rafa had our current owners it would have been a brilliant combination.
posted on 4/7/13
I disagree with you righteous. Liverpool raked in tons of money when Rafa was in charge. We were always in the last four or thereabouts in the Champions League and always in the top 4 in England.
I definitely don't think Rafa didn't care about finances. Honestly I think to think so is outrageous. IMO Rafa knew exactly what the club could afford and what it couldn't and made demands based on this and therefore his frustration at not getting it. If the Yanks didn't have us paying 40m pounds a year in interest payments alone and we turned in a profit inspite of the yanks at the time!!!!
We had an opportrunity to establish a dynasty with what Rafa was doing I feel if he was given the support he had built quite a formidable force but the wheels will come off if you are getting half baked support consistently.
Our wage bill at the time was consistent with a CL club so I don't really look at it the same way. We had to reduce it when we dropped out of the CL due to income going down IMO.
posted on 4/7/13
what Red Mamba said
posted on 4/7/13
Remember also that Dubai came in and offered G&H a 500m offer for the club they bought for 250m.
They said they wanted 750m (1bn dollars)
What a pair of
posted on 4/7/13
You can't credit all of United's success to Fergie as he had help but without him United would probably still be floundering.
In the same way you can't blame H & G for everything but they were still entirely responsible for our downfall in that same respect if you get what I mean.