Liverpool FC sack Rafael Benitez
Rafael Benitez’ six-year reign as Liverpool manager is effectively over this morning.
The 50-year-old Spanish boss has been offered a £3million severance package to walk away from the club, thereby forgoing a £16million windfall if he was sacked.
It is a damning vote of no confidence from Liverpool’s board, and there is no coming back from that for Benitez, with the confirmation of his departure expected to be announced within the next 48 hours, thereby bringing an end to the managerial reign of one of the most colourful bosses in the club’s history.
Appointed in the summer of 2004, Benitez miraculously won the Champions League in his first season in charge, beating AC Milan on penalties in Istanbul after coming from 3-0 down at half time, a feat that immediately saw the expectations at the club – a club still very much in transition – skyrocket to a level that he was never able to match.
An FA Cup and a losing Champions League final followed in the next seasons, but the boss was never able land Liverpool’s Holy Grail, the Premier League title, never coming closer than 2008/09’s second-place finish with 86 points, the same amount that champions Chelsea achieved in the following campaign.
Last season’s dismal season ended in a seventh placed finish, but was played out amid the backdrop of some of the most chaotic times in Liverpool’s history.
This is indeed a turbulent, worrying period at Liverpool – England’s most successful football club – with American owners Tom Hicks and George Gillett having put them up for sale in April amid mounting supporter unrest and a quite staggering amount of debt, all borrowed by the owners when they bought the club.
Benitez has been at odds with the Americans almost ever since they walked through Anfield’s Shankly Gates in April 2007.
Battles over a lack of money for transfers became commonplace, with Benitez claiming that he needed fresh investment in his playing squad if he was to continue challenging the elite, and the owners – who admitted holding discussions with Jürgen Klinsmann about the manager’s position in early 2008 – pointing out that he hadn’t been entirely successful with the purchases that he’d made.
The truth probably lies somewhere in between.
There are a raft of names that Benitez’ detractors like to throw at him when discussing his transfer failures, but there are the successes too.
He will always be the man who brought Fernando Torres to Anfield – at a time when there were still reservations about the forward – while the likes of Pepe Reina, Javier Mascherano, Dirk Kuyt and Daniel Agger are also considered successful purchases.
Benitez was hugely popular with the supporters inside Anfield, more so than most of the managers in the club’s history.
He quickly identified with the supporters, tapping into the undeniable sense of pride and passion they feel about their club. They responded in kind, backing him to the hilt in the tough times – and there were few tougher than last season – and hoping, praying that he could steer their ship through the choppiest of seas.
Now, he won’t get that chance.
After seemingly spending the vast majority of his Liverpool career “on the brink” of an exit – bookies had to stop taking bets that he’d been sacked on the day of a Champions League tie at Real Madrid’s Bernabéu Stadium in February 2009; Liverpool won 1-0 – he has now walked the plank.
Undeniably an excellent tactician, his reign began to unravel when he appeared to start concentrating more on the boardroom than the training pitch, negotiating a new contract that gave him a huge amount of power through all aspects of the club.
What happens to that club next is anyone’s guess.
With no immediate takeover on the horizon, and vultures circling over their best players, some form of stability is required ahead of the coming season if Liverpool are to start a long climb back towards the summit of English and European football.
Benitez had overseen the first, often impressive, part of that climb.
The failure to go any higher now sees him fall on his sword.
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