! Why Liverpool must NOT turn to Rafa Benitez or Kenny Dalglish as Roy Hodgson's replacement
By IAN LADYMAN
Last updated at 1:07 AM on 31st December 2010
Last updated at 1:07 AM on 31st December 2010
It is indicative of Liverpool’s miserable predicament that many of their followers are looking backwards, rather than forwards, for a way out of the mess.
As Roy Hodgson flounders in a role in which he has looked uncomfortable, the names of Kenny Dalglish and Rafael Benitez loom large.
Liverpool supporters have always had a reputation for being knowledgeable.
On the brink: Liverpool manager Roy Hodgson
They are romantics too, though, and currently it is dewy-eyed sentimentality and not logic that is turning their thoughts back towards two men from their glorious past.
It seems wrong to be talking of a successor for Hodgson while he — a decent man — still has a job.
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It is unavoidable, though, because last summer’s appointment is losing his battle for acceptance. On the Kop on Wednesday night, a banner read: ‘Rafa Come Home’. Towards the end of a deflating defeat by Wolves, they sang Dalglish’s name.
Between them the two men have won seven major trophies as managers of Liverpool. Dalglish would certainly take the job again while Benitez — back on Merseyside after a disastrous spell at Inter Milan — would inevitably be interested.
Neither, though, should be allowed anywhere near it. Dalglish, at 59, is by no means an old man. His old rival at Manchester United, Sir Alex Ferguson, has a decade on him.
But it is 15 years since he managed successfully — winning the Premier League at Blackburn — and almost 20 years since stress forced him out of Anfield after a 4-4 FA Cup draw with Everton in February 1991.
Quite simply, Dalglish has been away from the sharp end of football too long. The game has changed in many ways since he won Liverpool’s 18th and most recent title.
Many young players, particularly the foreign ones, would not be inspired by the mere mention of his name or his presence in a room. Some — as dreadful as it sounds — would not even know who he was.
A year at Newcastle in 1997 proved that Dalglish’s nerve ends had indeed frayed. He was tetchy with the media. He looked uncomfortable. Fourteen years on and back at a club with which he is synonymous, the demands on Dalglish would be almost impossible to measure. Would he cope?
History suggests that it is unlikely and to see him try — and fail — to turn this great club back round would be too painful to bear. Even as a shortterm fix, the return of King Kenny is a romantic notion and should remain just that.
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Benitez, of course, may have a more compelling case. At just 50, the Spaniard is arguably in his peak years as a coach.
Despite his rather dispiriting time at Inter this season, his pedigree remains high and his track record compares favourably to most. By the time he left Anfield last summer, though, Benitez had lost his way and so had his squad, a vast number of whom simply didn’t like him.
Forefront: Liverpool's new director of football strategy Damien Comolli
For all his achievements, and despite the testing circumstances under which he undeniably had to work, Liverpool had already seen the best of Benitez.
The fact Hodgson arrived to find a squad so clearly unfit for purpose was not solely Benitez’s fault. Nevertheless, it was partly his fault. For example, Benitez left his successor without a proper, reliable full back on either side.
By the time he left after six remarkable years, his judgment was on the wane, on and off the field. Maybe it could change now that the club are under new ownership. With Tom Hicks and George Gillett back in Texas and former managing director Christian Purslow — with whom he never got on — now marginalised, some Liverpool followers may think Benitez would be able to turn back time.
It’s unlikely. For a start, in Damien Comolli, the modern Liverpool has a director of football strategy, a man who we learn today will be in charge of January’s Anfield transfer business and indeed the appointment of the next manager.
How easily would Benitez work with a man who is now the most powerful football figure at the club?
The answer is clear. He couldn’t. The Spaniard is, after all, one of the modern game’s greatest control freaks.
A look at the current Liverpool squad tells us that Benitez’s name is written right through it. In good ways and in bad. It is clear also, though, that Liverpool need to look forward.
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This is a club crying out for new direction rather than a desperate attempt to recycle old formulae. If and when Hodgson does leave then Comolli will be the kingmaker.
As such, there will be few options on the continent who will go unexplored. Already talk of Didier Deschamps of Marseille has circulated and that is understandable.
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The former French captain has been successful as a coach in his home country. More curious is the touting of 33-year-old Andre Villas-Boas, the Porto coach who has learned all he knows from Jose Mourinho at Inter and at Chelsea.
To appoint someone like that would represent a huge leap of faith and it is hard to see what Villas-Boas would have over domestic candidates such as Bolton’s Owen Coyle or the currently unemployed Martin O’Neill.
What is beyond doubt is that Liverpool face tough decisions. It is to be hoped they make them without feeling the need to look over their shoulders first.
Torres out of touch
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-1342857/Liverpool-NOT-turn-Rafa-Benitez-Kenny-Dalglish-Roy-Hodgsons-replacement.html#ixzz19fb08Tgd
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