Rafael Benitez

[BedfordBlue]

That was the final straw for me 100% his loss today got it totally wrong 

[Sibdane]

I still think he needs more time. Bad result today for sure(and recently), but this season was destined to be a shitshow no matter the manager.

[Newty82]

What a horrible horrible...horrible situation we find ourselves in.

I've never been a fan of how quickly we've sacked managers. Now here we are with a man on the worse run out of all of them and because of those hasty decisions - we're stuck.

We've no choice but to carry on with him. Don't get me wrong, there's things I fully agree with from his perspective - Wasted money, poor policies, poorly managed injuries, jobs for the boys...but it starts to feel like this is classic Rafa and his usual reflect attention elsewhere technique, which he has done many, many times over the years, at every club, whenever things don't go his way.

What I want from Rafa just now is 100% focus on the pitch. Boardroom battles, treatment room spats and all that other shite - you can get involved on that when we're playing much better and getting points. Until then, just do your principle fuckin job.

[BedfordBlue]

I said before the game we can't keep sacking managers but I can't think of another result where its 100% the managers fault. He couldn't have got his tactics more wrong if he had tried 

[plaidharper]

Just now, BedfordBlue said:

I said before the game we can't keep sacking managers but I can't think of another result where its 100% the managers fault. He couldn't have got his tactics more wrong if he had tried 

Indeed.  We keep playing 5 at the back like that we won't win another game all season.

[dunlopp9987]

I don't quite understand the gloom and doom of "we're in serious relegation trouble now." We're 8 points above the drop? Sure I'd love for us to be 20 points above the drop, but it's not as if we're right in there with the bottom 4.

If it continues like this and we actually find ourselves in a relegation battle, then I think we look at replacing Rafa. But again, who do we bring in? 

[Bailey]

I think we just need to start trying to have more control in the game. We aren't his Liverpool or Chelsea teams where there are quality finishers that take one half chance to score or quality defenders that can bail us out of trouble. 

Every time we play in these tight games it feels as if its one end to the other and at the moment the other teams are sharper at both ends than we are. 

[Bailey]

1 minute ago, dunlopp9987 said:

I don't quite understand the gloom and doom of "we're in serious relegation trouble now." We're 8 points above the drop? Sure I'd love for us to be 20 points above the drop, but it's not as if we're right in there with the bottom 4.

If it continues like this and we actually find ourselves in a relegation battle, then I think we look at replacing Rafa. But again, who do we bring in? 

I don't think we have to be concerned about relegation because I can't see us not picking up points along the way but I don't see us staying that much ahead of the battle which is almost as bad IMO. 

[memmaclub2]

Surely just get him out and give it to someone who can motivate these players to try and win

[dunlopp9987]

2 minutes ago, memmaclub2 said:

Surely just get him out and give it to someone who can motivate these players to try and win

And again, at what point do we stop doing this as a club. 

[plaidharper]

According to Benítez’s programme notes: “We have used the time without matches to prepare as intensively as possible for the challenges Brighton present. This means understanding how to make it difficult for them to impose their style and, equally importantly, knowing how to create the chances to win the game.”

[memmaclub2]

2 minutes ago, dunlopp9987 said:

And again, at what point do we stop doing this as a club. 

Martinez made progress but suffered from a European campaign and a lack of depth. I think with the money we have septa he could have gone on.

Koeman wasted money like it was going out of fashion and served the sack.

Silva made progress but maybe was not good enough 

Allardyce was a panic buy and deserved to be sacked.

Carlo A made progress but was always going to jump ship

Rafa has come in and had a worse record than al of these guys prior to sacking but yet is getting more time.

I agree your point of don't keep sacking managers but out of all of them this one is the worst one to stick with (Maybe Allardyce is worse)

 

[Makis]

18 minutes ago, Bailey said:

I don't think we have to be concerned about relegation because I can't see us not picking up points along the way but I don't see us staying that much ahead of the battle which is almost as bad IMO. 

We have been dead last in the firm table for ages. What just about keeps our head above the water is those first few matches. Since then we have been relegation form.

[Bailey]

2 minutes ago, Makis said:

We have been dead last in the firm table for ages. What just about keeps our head above the water is those first few matches. Since then we have been relegation form.

We are currently 15th according to whoscored based on our last 6 games (4 points).

EDIT: I will just add that I dont know how that works because only 3 teams have picked up less than points than is in the same game period. Still doesnt make us last though.

[Bailey]

In a slight defence of Rafa I will also add that I think we are playing better football than we did under Ancelotti and we are creating more chances. 

Even before he jumped ship, a lot of people wanted him to stay another season. 

[dunlopp9987]

Yeah I'm shocked at how defensively porous we've been, considering everyone and their mother said we'd play drab, defensive football all season.

We seem to be scoring and creating more chances than we did under Carlo

[Zoo 2.0]

5 minutes ago, dunlopp9987 said:

Yeah I'm shocked at how defensively porous we've been, considering everyone and their mother said we'd play drab, defensive football all season.

We seem to be scoring and creating more chances than we did under Carlo

Please tell me that's a wind up.

Edit: If not, this time last season under Ancelotti we had scored 38 goals, under Benitez we currently have 23 - a decrease of 15.

[dunlopp9987]

2 minutes ago, Zoo 2.0 said:

Please tell me that's a wind up.

I mean, just looking at stats, we scored 7 in Carlo's last 10 matches and we've scored 7 in Rafa's last 5.

[Bailey]

5 minutes ago, dunlopp9987 said:

Yeah I'm shocked at how defensively porous we've been, considering everyone and their mother said we'd play drab, defensive football all season.

We seem to be scoring and creating more chances than we did under Carlo

To be fair it is drab, defensive football. The only thing we can do is counter attack. That is the massive difference compared to last year IMO.

Whenever we have to try and break teams down we are all fingers and thumbs. 

[dunlopp9987]

5 minutes ago, Zoo 2.0 said:

Please tell me that's a wind up.

Edit: If not, this time last season under Ancelotti we had scored 38 goals, under Benitez we currently have 23 - a decrease of 15.

Oh for sure, we started last season like a house on fire. But then you look at our scoring as the season progressed and it went down the drain (with the exception of a few games)

2 minutes ago, Bailey said:

To be fair it is drab, defensive football. The only thing we can do is counter attack. That is the massive difference compared to last year IMO.

Whenever we have to try and break teams down we are all fingers and thumbs. 

I would be fine with us being a counter-attack team, in the style of Leicester in 2015/16. Problem is, we have a shit back line and not enough playmakers going forward

[memmaclub2]

13 minutes ago, Bailey said:

In a slight defence of Rafa I will also add that I think we are playing better football than we did under Ancelotti and we are creating more chances. 

Even before he jumped ship, a lot of people wanted him to stay another season. 

I am going to have to take your word for this as I can't remember us playing this badly since alladyce

[dunlopp9987]

Just now, memmaclub2 said:

I am going to have to take your word for this as I can't remember us playing this badly since alladyce

Oh there were some performances last season where people on here were moaning "this is the worst I've ever seen us play." 

Seems to be a running theme from season to season, no matter who's in charge. There's always games where we play "the worst we ever have."

[duncanmckenzieismagic]

Had a interesting chat with a mate  of mine who knows someone at Finch Farm before the game and he told me an hour before the line ups were announced that we would be playing that formation with Coleman on the left .Apparently they’ve been practising  it all week in training, not that it showed

It clearly didn’t work and I can’t believe he left it so late to change it . The players didn’t seem to have a clue what they were doing and the second goal summed it all up. 
 

Seemed ridiculous to have Coleman playing out of position with Digne sat on the bench, although he also  said that Digne is meant to be a right tit and has a massive attitude which is why he has had the bust up with Rafa 

 

[memmaclub2]

I can't be bothered to look back but when did we have a record as bad as 6 from 36 and 1 win in 12.

[Gwlad]

37 minutes ago, duncanmckenzieismagic said:

Had a interesting chat with a mate  of mine who knows someone at Finch Farm before the game and he told me an hour before the line ups were announced that we would be playing that formation with Coleman on the left .Apparently they’ve been practising  it all week in training, not that it showed

It clearly didn’t work and I can’t believe he left it so late to change it . The players didn’t seem to have a clue what they were doing and the second goal summed it all up. 
 

Seemed ridiculous to have Coleman playing out of position with Digne sat on the bench, although he also  said that Digne is meant to be a right tit and has a massive attitude which is why he has had the bust up with Rafa 

 

Cue Gallic shrug 

[Romey 1878]

I was going to wait until I'd cooled down to post in this thread but fuck it, I need to say this shit and I need to say it now.

I want this fucker gone and I want him gone now. He is going to take us down. I cannot believe there are still some of our fans that don't see how much trouble we're in.

Where is this tactically astute manager he supposedly is? Three at the back is not something we have the players for, so why the fuck go with it? You could have predicted disaster with that before a ball was fucking kicked. Then you play a sub-par right back as a fucking left wing back while you have an international quality left back sat on the fucking bench. I don't give a shiny shit if they've had a falling out, you fucking play him because that left us unbelievably unbalanced on the left due to having two players there who both wanted to cut back inside onto their right foot. He's a hypocritical knob head and is doing exactly the opposite of what he asked of Digne - to put the team first.

And then why not change things when it obviously wasn't working? He waited until 13 minutes from the bastard end of the game before he did anything. He should have made at least one change at half time. Nope! Then he should've made a change the instant we got one back. Nope! The only reason we'd managed to drag ourselves back into the game was because of the sheer power of will from Gordon and Gray, it wasn't because our master tactician had done a fucking thing.

Just for those that need a fucking comfort blanket for any criticism aimed at our esteemed conductor the majority of the players were atrocious too. The midfield two of Allan and Doucoure were fucking diabolical and offered no protection whatsoever for the defence, who then proceeded to wilt under the pressure.

All of them can fuck off and then fuck off some more until they have time to fuck off again.

[MC11]

1 hour ago, duncanmckenzieismagic said:

Had a interesting chat with a mate  of mine who knows someone at Finch Farm before the game and he told me an hour before the line ups were announced that we would be playing that formation with Coleman on the left .Apparently they’ve been practising  it all week in training, not that it showed

It clearly didn’t work and I can’t believe he left it so late to change it . The players didn’t seem to have a clue what they were doing and the second goal summed it all up. 
 

Seemed ridiculous to have Coleman playing out of position with Digne sat on the bench, although he also  said that Digne is meant to be a right tit and has a massive attitude which is why he has had the bust up with Rafa 

 

Digne should be playing in a better team tbh mate. Highly doubt he’s a tit he just wants better. 

[Zoo 2.0]

 

[duncanmckenzieismagic]

12 minutes ago, MC11 said:

Digne should be playing in a better team tbh mate. Highly doubt he’s a tit he just wants better. 

Don’t suppose we will ever know the truth but it’s a very reliable source that has him down as a bad apple 

Personally I like him as a player but plenty on here wanted to see the back of Digne due to his poor form but then slate Rafa for dropping him

[MC11]

2 minutes ago, duncanmckenzieismagic said:

Don’t suppose we will ever know the truth but it’s a very reliable source that has him down as a bad apple 

Personally I like him as a player but plenty on here wanted to see the back of Digne due to his poor form but then slate Rafa for dropping him

He was far from the problem. A reliable source states a world class defender wants better. 

We are in serious serious trouble under this lunatic. the club is just existing under his tenure. It’s shambolic. He’s lost the dressing room as well it’s very very obvious.