Rafael Benitez

[Zoo 2.0]

Considering we'll probably get battered against Chelsea, I can see things getting really ugly for the next home game (forget who we're against). I think it's obvious that more and more people have had enough, I've been "Benitez Out" since October and remain in that bracket, I've always given managers time (perhaps more than they should) but have flipped completely the opposite under this regime.

It shows how bad things are when I would genuinely take either Ferguson or Martinez as our managers right now, and that's fucking terrifying.

[StevO]

2 minutes ago, Zoo 2.0 said:

Considering we'll probably get battered against Chelsea, I can see things getting really ugly for the next home game (forget who we're against). I think it's obvious that more and more people have had enough, I've been "Benitez Out" since October and remain in that bracket, I've always given managers time (perhaps more than they should) but have flipped completely the opposite under this regime.

It shows how bad things are when I would genuinely take either Ferguson or Martinez as our managers right now, and that's fucking terrifying.

Leicester mate. Who won 4-0 without Vardy today. The way both teams played today they would put ten past us. 

[c1982]

27 minutes ago, Bailey said:

I dont see him being sacked as Mohsiri has by all accounts picked him over Brands. He wont want to look like even more of a fool by sacking them both in quick succession. 

If he’s smart, he will sack Rafa and bring in a new DoF and give him full control - he can then justify that as a restructure/new direction rather than picking between Rafa/Brands.

[c1982]

56 minutes ago, Gwlad all over said:

Our squad is thin so I want him to have the January window. A couple of Demarai/Townsend signings, get rid of some dross if we can and ffs give the young players a run. If he doesn't do anything along those lines then he's finished and once again who is going to come to us?

And please, not Jose, it's a shit show at ROma by all accounts.

Would you really trust Rafa with ‘full-control’ in Jan though? It could see Digne and Allan go if the fall-outs are true and who knows coming in?!

[Cornish Steve]

5 minutes ago, c1982 said:

Would you really trust Rafa with ‘full-control’ in Jan though? It could see Digne and Allan go if the fall-outs are true and who knows coming in?!

Add Richarlison to the mix (who started the season so fired up after we let him play for Brazil). Sadly, I can see at least one player getting a red against Chelsea just to make a point.

[c1982]

 

[Romey 1878]

7 minutes ago, c1982 said:

 

Cue the announcement that our manager is now the chairman of the club as well. 

[Btay]

I don’t like to see the chop and changing of managers - but I don’t enjoy watching us. It’s Big Sam all over, it’s hard enough to get up in the middle of the night but even more so now. There’s reasons why we are shit but I just don’t like the style of play one bit.

[Newty82]

1 hour ago, Gwlad all over said:

Our squad is thin so I want him to have the January window. A couple of Demarai/Townsend signings, get rid of some dross if we can and ffs give the young players a run. If he doesn't do anything along those lines then he's finished and once again who is going to come to us?

And please, not Jose, it's a shit show at ROma by all accounts.

This is the thing though. The dross is worth fuck all. We're not allowed to spend anything worthwhile. So we're pretty much stuck. And, even if the dross was worth something, we can't afford to let anyone go as our squad is so thin. It's such a shit situation this club has been taken too.

And, again, probs why Rafa is getting way more patience from me and others than he probably deserves. Or we're all just so numb to the clubs circumstances these days.

[Bailey]

1 hour ago, c1982 said:

If he’s smart, he will sack Rafa and bring in a new DoF and give him full control - he can then justify that as a restructure/new direction rather than picking between Rafa/Brands.

Do you see him doing that though? 

In the last few days its been announced that Benitez has control of almost all of the football side of the club and then he gets sacked and replaced?

Furthermore, if Mohsiri wanted to pass everything onto a DoF then why didn't he just do that with Brands in the first place?

[c1982]

15 minutes ago, Bailey said:

Do you see him doing that though? 

In the last few days its been announced that Benitez has control of almost all of the football side of the club and then he gets sacked and replaced?

Furthermore, if Mohsiri wanted to pass everything onto a DoF then why didn't he just do that with Brands in the first place?

“If he’s smart…”

He must be a smart businessman to get to where he has but it doesn’t seem he knows too much about how to run a football club effectively.

[StevO]

1 hour ago, c1982 said:

“If he’s smart…”

He must be a smart businessman to get to where he has but it doesn’t seem he knows too much about how to run a football club effectively.

Exactly why he needs an experienced CEO and DOF to run things for him, and let him just sit back and take the glory when it pays off. 

[Palfy]

12 minutes ago, StevO said:

Exactly why he needs an experienced CEO and DOF to run things for him, and let him just sit back and take the glory when it pays off. 

Haven’t we already had a couple of experienced DoF in the last 6 years, one who spent 200 million in 2.5 years and another who spent 300 million in 3.5 years. Not even Moshiri would be foolish enough to go back down that route, anyway even with his money he couldn’t take the chance and sustain those types of losses again he has to find a different way forward, that’s why he’s going with the manager in control of all team matters, which personally I prefer is Benitez the right man who knows at this stage, but one things for sure we couldn’t carry on the way we were. 

[Cornish Steve]

3 hours ago, Palfy said:

Haven’t we already had a couple of experienced DoF in the last 6 years, one who spent 200 million in 2.5 years and another who spent 300 million in 3.5 years. Not even Moshiri would be foolish enough to go back down that route, anyway even with his money he couldn’t take the chance and sustain those types of losses again he has to find a different way forward, that’s why he’s going with the manager in control of all team matters, which personally I prefer is Benitez the right man who knows at this stage, but one things for sure we couldn’t carry on the way we were. 

We've had one experienced DoF - Brands - but he pointedly wasn't allowed to do his job without massive interference. Personally, I think he should have quit a while back as a way to object, but his personality seems too forgiving for that role.

[Palfy]

25 minutes ago, Cornish Steve said:

We've had one experienced DoF - Brands - but he pointedly wasn't allowed to do his job without massive interference. Personally, I think he should have quit a while back as a way to object, but his personality seems too forgiving for that role.

So what you trying to say Steve exactly that the same wouldn’t happen to another experienced DoF? You may not call Walsh experienced but he oversaw the buying of players for a team that went on to win the PL which then sold a few of the players for millions of profit, not bad wouldn’t you agree? Who’s Moshiri going to backdown to as a DoF and allow to do the job without interference?

[Cornish Steve]

16 minutes ago, Palfy said:

So what you trying to say Steve exactly that the same wouldn’t happen to another experienced DoF? You may not call Walsh experienced but he oversaw the buying of players for a team that went on to win the PL which then sold a few of the players for millions of profit, not bad wouldn’t you agree? Who’s Moshiri going to backdown to as a DoF and allow to do the job without interference?

Good question - and even more importantly, is he capable of doing so?

[Aidan]

I think the Digne decision and taking Richarlison off yesterday really has put the nail in the coffin.

[Palfy]

1 hour ago, Aidan said:

I think the Digne decision and taking Richarlison off yesterday really has put the nail in the coffin.

Digne deserves the fact that he’s not playing, not because he had words with Rafa but because he’d gone to rat’s shit for so long and was getting away with it, his outspokenness meant Rafa had to find a different way and he has Godfrey who is starting to look far better than Digne. 
He reportedly said he took Richarlison off because he had sustained In injury, whether this is true or not I’m sure will be made clear in the next day or so, but besides that Richarlison was pretty much non productive he was clearly not himself, and the manager has made a decision to change it because it wasn’t working and to be honest I think it had the desired effect with the 2 subs coming on. But I’m sorry no manager can legislate for the 2 big fuck up’s from Gray and Coleman, but they seem to be very quickly forgotten and all the blame for years of shit have been shoved all in the direction of one man, who’s not had a proper opportunity to change it, I know emotions are high and rage is blind, but sacking Benitez now would be very foolish, nobody would do much better but plenty would do a lot worse.

 I wonder how many would admit to wishing they had taken the opportunity to get up and walk out for 5 minutes now, if we don’t get a decent budget for new players in January window your all be getting another opportunity very soon. 

[Aidan]

9 minutes ago, Palfy said:

Digne deserves the fact that he’s not playing, not because he had words with Rafa but because he’d gone to rat’s shit for so long and was getting away with it, his outspokenness meant Rafa had to find a different way and he has Godfrey who is starting to look far better than Digne. 
He reportedly said he took Richarlison off because he had sustained In injury, whether this is true or not I’m sure will be made clear in the next day or so, but besides that Richarlison was pretty much non productive he was clearly not himself, and the manager has made a decision to change it because it wasn’t working and to be honest I think it had the desired effect with the 2 subs coming on. But I’m sorry no manager can legislate for the 2 big fuck up’s from Gray and Coleman, but they seem to be very quickly forgotten and all the blame for years of shit have been shoved all in the direction of one man, who’s not had a proper opportunity to change it, I know emotions are high and rage is blind, but sacking Benitez now would be very foolish, nobody would do much better but plenty would do a lot worse.

 I wonder how many would admit to wishing they had taken the opportunity to get up and walk out for 5 minutes now, if we don’t get a decent budget for new players in January window your all be getting another opportunity very soon. 

Oh I'm taking it from the general perspective of fans. Tension is high and fans are losing patience quickly. I can't see him being here next year. Not much has gone his way.

[Palfy]

1 minute ago, Aidan said:

Oh I'm taking it from the general perspective of fans. Tension is high and fans are losing patience quickly. I can't see him being here next year. Not much has gone his way.

I might be wrong and he does get the bullet in the next couple of weeks from Moshiri to take the heat off him and appease the fans, but I very much doubt it because that means Moshiri will have to take full responsibility for what happens next he doesn’t have a right hand man anymore, I can’t begin to imagine what a complete fuck up it would be if he had to find and appoint another manager left to his own devices, to fucking scary to contemplate. 

[Bill]

I'd be happy to put  Duncan and Unsy in charge till the season ends, by then the board and the owner should have sorted the club out.  We just can't keep going on like this, fans are against him and players are falling out with him.  The club is in a mess and seriously needs sorting out.

[Aidan]

4 hours ago, Palfy said:

I might be wrong and he does get the bullet in the next couple of weeks from Moshiri to take the heat off him and appease the fans, but I very much doubt it because that means Moshiri will have to take full responsibility for what happens next he doesn’t have a right hand man anymore, I can’t begin to imagine what a complete fuck up it would be if he had to find and appoint another manager left to his own devices, to fucking scary to contemplate. 

That being said it makes you wonder how many people on the board wanted Rafa. We are sure Moshiri certainly did, I wonder what the others at the club had to say about it.

42 minutes ago, Bill said:

I'd be happy to put  Duncan and Unsy in charge till the season ends, by then the board and the owner should have sorted the club out.  We just can't keep going on like this, fans are against him and players are falling out with him.  The club is in a mess and seriously needs sorting out.

I think the only thing we have left to try is Dunc. He did so well in charge last time however I understand why the club were sceptical to give him the role any longer than they did.  If Rafa went tomorrow my choice would be to put Dunc in charge and give it him for the rest of the season, then make the decision then. At least we will have someone in charge of the squad who actually cares about the club and hopefully that will rub off on the players.

[Romey 1878]

What Ferguson did wasn't even sustainable for the short amount of time he did the job for. He just had them running on adrenaline and once that ran out we looked shite again in the last game. It’s not sustainable so I don’t think giving it to him until the end of the season would work out at all.

That's without going into me thinking he shouldn’t still be at the club after being involved in another failed management set up. 

[Sibdane]

 

[RuffRob]

The whole situation is a shambles really - I didn't want Benitez here to start with because risk would be he would never been wholly excepted by Evertonians - especially if there was a run of bad results - pretty much everybody called this. A toxic situation would boil up and that is what is happening. 

I have done my best to get behind him, but it's becoming obvious its just not going to work, if the fans are not accepting of him and a significant proportion dead against him, then makes it so easy for players to fall out with him (as fans will rally behind the players over Benitez - even if in truth the players are out of order). 

Truth is most of our players are just not all that, collectively a middle of the table team is what they are. No manager yet has seemed to be able to get a consistent tune out of them. 

Head says, Benitez is in charge - players, fans and board all get behind him and give him a decent chance for the greater good of the club. But in reality I am coming to the conclusion this is not going to happen and is just likely to get worse - so what's the point. 

Question - who the fuck would want to manage us at this moment in time? and if anybody did I would be cynically wondering why.  

@Romey 1878 has it spot on about Ferguson he's been around too many failed regimes at the club and this squad needs a major overhaul. He just does not have the experience needed to on his own be handed what little funds we have. Irony being if Ferguson became temporary manager he would benefit from Brands being at his side. 

 

[Cornish Steve]

For those defending the manager, putting all else aside, I have just one question: Can you please explain to me the manager's strategy for winning games? As we play each game, I personally have no clue what the team is doing. Even in the win against Arsenal, that was won by individual creativity and pure desire to give the fans something to cheer, and I could ascertain no obvious game plan.

[Bailey]

10 hours ago, Palfy said:

Digne deserves the fact that he’s not playing, not because he had words with Rafa but because he’d gone to rat’s shit for so long and was getting away with it, his outspokenness meant Rafa had to find a different way and he has Godfrey who is starting to look far better than Digne. 
He reportedly said he took Richarlison off because he had sustained In injury, whether this is true or not I’m sure will be made clear in the next day or so, but besides that Richarlison was pretty much non productive he was clearly not himself, and the manager has made a decision to change it because it wasn’t working and to be honest I think it had the desired effect with the 2 subs coming on. But I’m sorry no manager can legislate for the 2 big fuck up’s from Gray and Coleman, but they seem to be very quickly forgotten and all the blame for years of shit have been shoved all in the direction of one man, who’s not had a proper opportunity to change it, I know emotions are high and rage is blind, but sacking Benitez now would be very foolish, nobody would do much better but plenty would do a lot worse.

 I wonder how many would admit to wishing they had taken the opportunity to get up and walk out for 5 minutes now, if we don’t get a decent budget for new players in January window your all be getting another opportunity very soon. 

You are very quick to highlight Digne but what about all the other players serving up shite week in week out that still play or form part of the bench. There is no doubt in my mind that Digne would be starting if there hadnt been a spat.

Managers can legislate for fuck ups. Not in those individual moments but the thing we learned from Martinez is that poorly managed teams lead to players making mistakes. Players that are confident and have trust in what they are being asked to do make less mistakes. Consistent errors from a variety of players, reflect upon the manager.

As for Richarlison, he was just completely isolated. We had little of the ball and the ball we did play up to him was shite. I get bringing Rondon on, but Gordon hasnt proven to be a goal threat and yet a player that scored 3 goals the week before gets hooked. I know who I would rather have on the pitch. 

I think this bunch of players are better than relegation form. There are some really poor squads in the league and ours is better than that. Palace certainly arent 3-1 better than us for example!

[Wiggytop]

The lack of a game plan is my main concern, we made Palace look like Barca yesterday, they played through us so easily, our response was to lump the ball up to Richy, who isn’t that type of forward, if I can see that why can’t a manager with so much experience? Maybe when people said Rafa had lost the skill to manage in the PL they were right.

 

[Formby]

1 hour ago, Cornish Steve said:

For those defending the manager, putting all else aside, I have just one question: Can you please explain to me the manager's strategy for winning games? As we play each game, I personally have no clue what the team is doing. Even in the win against Arsenal, that was won by individual creativity and pure desire to give the fans something to cheer, and I could ascertain no obvious game plan.

I think he is trying to win games by utilisng the little talent that we have fit and available.

A precis of my reply to you on 2nd December, post-Liverpool game:

I guess, like many, you would have preferred a 433? That sytem relies on width from your full backs and I think Benitez has quickly realised that our full backs are crap. So, he is taking a gamble and trying to get some width in a 442. That does leave us light in the middle, so it's a calculated risk. Liverpool destroyed United and Arsenal recently, so you take your poison whichever system you want. We also have no creative midfielder so our midfield 3 provide zero going forward...

DCL makes a massive difference to the team... the system appears to be designed to get Gray on the ball in space (the individual creativity you mention). When DCL is playing, it gives all the forwards more space.

Benitez will undoubtedly go. All managers go, so there's not much art in predicting it. When he goes, we will still have two crap full backs, no creative central midfielder, two dodgy centre backs. I think Benitez's pickups have been decent. I would like to give him a chance in the January sales but I think this will be a minority view. 

[barryj]

I’ve got behind him following his appointment and given him the benefit of the doubt with the injuries and poor run but some of the decision making recently has been baffling to put it nicely. I didn’t want the instability of yet another manager change but from what I’ve seen I now know he’s not right for the club, it will never work and he’s not the one to take us forward. His philosophy’s are archaic and I don’t want yet another manger wasting money on their own players to fit a system the next ones unlikely to play. In addition to this he’s now exiled our best (& only LB) of which I’m worried we’ll go on to sell and I don’t trust in his replacement.