Liverpool's Ryan Babel hits out at former boss
Liverpool attacker Ryan Babel has hit out at former manager Rafael Benitez, claiming that he was not allowed to carry out any extra training to try and get back into the first team.
The Holland international joined the English Premier League club from Dutch giants Ajax in 2007 and he has struggled to show why Benitez shelled out a fee of £10m for his services with a string of disappointing performances on the pitch.
The 23-year-old suffered from a variety of injuries under Benitez, but claimed he was not allowed to put in any more time at the training ground than the rest of the squad, even when he was not featuring in the starting line-up.
He wrote on his Twitter page: “I wasn't allowed to train extra under our former manager. Even when I wasn't involved. I begged lots of times but it was simply not allowed. And during the season you don't train very hard cause you have lots (of) games so
most sessions we had were without sweating.
“But if I wanted to do some extra which I asked for every single day. I didn't have the permission. I even tried to train extra by doing it sneakily. But nope. And I had to get used to that because in Ajax we were staying for one or two hours longer on the
pitch by ourselves.”
Since moving to Liverpool, Babel has made 240 appearances across all competitions and has scored 41 goals. Babel has featured in five EPL games for the club this season.
He has yet to win any silverware with the Reds, but was part of the Holland squad which reached the 2010 FIFA World Cup final and won two Dutch Cups during his time with Ajax.
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