Liverpool FC Forum

by **66-1112520797** » Tue Jan 09, 2007 3:12 pm

I've had my head stuck in Robbie Fowlers autobiography recently, not yet finnished reading it and to be quite frank not wanting it to end its an interesting read.

I've seen Ciggy's post on the ' sick and tired of controlling games ' thread. And TBH thats not the only excuse I'm sick of
we've had managers over the last decade or so and fans also, suggesting we were either ' unlucky' or from the fans ' dont worry it will come soon'. This Kind of jargen has been spoke like for the best part of 16 years. Fans on forums saying 'be patient, give them time'.

Seventeen years later, thats plenty of time in my book players have come and gone so to managers. And to look at where we are at now well, still no holy grail so are we any nearer in reality ?

After reading the majority of Robbie's book and trying not to be to biased towards him, as we know there are two sides to most stories. He obviously felt the club could have gone places before Roy Evan's departure. With the youth and talent he had coming through, he thought the future looked bright. We all know what happened next with the club and where it went. Well infact roughly the same in league in a positional sense to the eight years prior that, added on by the a few good cup triumphs.

Now I'm not going to go on and s'lag our previous managers off theres no point. But back when Houllier took over the players and funds he had available. That was the time to make ground on Arsenal and Man United. 140 million pounds later and it didnt happen, we never really got any nearer to the title. Looking back at that time in and around the 99-01 seasons we, I think missed the best chance to get back to the pinnacle of football. Rafa's job has been made a whole lot harder by the fact that there seems to be restraints in his spending of money, although in saying that, and I dont know what the figure is. I'd say he spent near enough 40-50 million pounds. Which tbh it seems in todays market at the top end of the table and stretched over three years almost, is pocket change to the likes of Mourinho and Fergie.

So while Chelsea, Arsenal and Man United have got stronger and stronger, we seemed to been left behind some what in terms of team performances and results and also financially. While this has gone on
Liverpool FC have been cast aside into the darkness and have had to sit back and watch our rivals bask in Premiership glory for almost two decades.
And to make ourselves try and feel that little bit better we find ourselves making excuses ( fans and managers too). This has gone on for a very long time now.

Harbouring on what Fowlers says in his book about managers having to essentially build up team spirit to even remotely give themselves a chnace of winning matches. Without that your a pi.ss weak side if nothing else. I honestly wonder what category he'd put Rafa under. Before I get into that, I'm not convinced yet that Rafa is the perfect tactician most people on here lead us to believe. Whether its formations, substitutions, personel he has been found wanting in the tactical side of his game. Then there is the transfer market, now alot of managers make mistakes in their signings so in that respect Rafa is no different.

But going back to the question, ' what would Robbie make of Rafa ?' Well for my money Rafa seems the typical 'foreign' manager. Devotes his time and effort into the finer details of the game, covers every aspect over and over. Works on diet and science in football and very thoughtful in his approach to the game. On the other hand though, and from what I can make of it from a few stories here and there is that he doesnt seem to have that link or connection with his playes, I may well be wrong.

Here is a list of managers Fowler basiclly gives and says who he got on with and who he didnt.

Got on with. Didnt get on with

Dalglish Houllier
Souness Hoddle
Roy Evans Erricksson
Terry Venables
Kevin Keegan

I havent read as far as his Leeds days or Man.C days but I'll bet my bottom dollar that he respected and got on with Stuart Pearce. But I couldnt wager a bet on what catergory he'd put Benitez under. The guys on the left a mostly well known for the " good man-management" skills that are vital to any team or club (apart from Souness maybe

).

This could be possibly Benitez biggest flaw, in his management skills. By the way this ISNT a Rafa out thread, more of a ' I'm bored and can I make some kind of thought provoking post thread'. And according to a proffesional footballer that ' team spirit ' is needed just as much as anything else in the game of football. So I'm just wondeing whether we're going to be carrying on with the same old excuses that we've used after every poor performance for the last seventeen years, for the foreseable future.

by **Sabre** » Tue Jan 09, 2007 3:25 pm

While I followed Liverpool, I didn't know much of the surroundings of LFC or his manager's personalities back in the nineties.

But for what I know

' what would Robbie make of Rafa ?'

I think he'll be grateful towards Rafa. The man that brought him back to the team that he should have never left, the man who opposing to many doubters that thought he's past his best, gave him the chance to come back to one of the big english clubs, the kind of club he deserves.

To be honest I Sabre, would have liked to see more of Robbie this season. Specially for those games in which the opposition is deep.

I don't agree some of the points you make especially about Rafa's tactician skills. Nevertheless, it's a well thought post. Nice one.

by **Effes** » Tue Jan 09, 2007 4:19 pm

I think DIC may be more of a saviour than most managers have been - I hope.

by **PabloAimar** » Tue Jan 09, 2007 4:40 pm

the players all understand that rafa is not an 'arm-round-ur-shoulder' type of manager. he does everything he believes is best for the club and the players are well aware of this. gerrard makes a point of this in his book. in my opinion, if you're getting paid £100,000 a week, you shouldn't need an 'arm-round-ur-shoulder' approach to motivate u.

rafa is a professional paid to do a job and he's getting results.

with regards to gerrard houllier, he made 3 bad buys which messed the club up (diouf, diao and cheyrou) and didnt sign anelka when he should have done. dont forget he delivered the treble and almost died doing what he thought was best for the club. gerrard says houllier didnt let liverpool down; diouf, diao and cheyrou let houllier down.

steven gerrard says he'd prefer the lovey dovey kevin keegan approach from benitez but understands he'll never get it. when liverpool got knocked out of the fa cup by burnley, gerrard went storming into benitez's office demanding to know why he fielded a weakened team in the fa cup. benitez simply told him how it was, "we dont have the squad to compete in 4 competitions, it's for the best - wait and see." stevie never moaned about benitez's tactics again and they went on to lift ol' big ears. he also says benitez is a master at making the correct substitutions at crucial times - which he's proven many times now.

Bamaga Man, u'll read towards the end of the book when robbie goes to watch the champions' league final what he thinks of liverpool and i cant help thinking its that passage in the book that somebody tipped rafa off about and thats why we swooped for him last january. robbie is never going to leave lfc again. end of.

ps. rafa is the man, and the players know it.

by **mattylfc** » Tue Jan 09, 2007 4:56 pm

I have read Robbies book and i thought it was a very good read. He mentioned that he didnt have the best relationship with Houllier and Thompson at times and felt that they wanted him out but its easy to form conclusions when you get one side of the story. Houllier was labelled by some (e.g S.Gerrard) as a man manager and was seen as a father figure to many. The fact that Fowler went through a patch of not getting in much under Houllier may have something to do with their up and down relationship. There isnt many players who have a great relationship with the manager when they arent making the first eleven on a regular basis.

With regards to Rafa, i think he just has a completely different approach. As you say, he probably spends much more time analysing fooball and tries to keep a little distance between players and the Gaffa but he obviously feels that this approach gets the best out of players. Its his way of getting respect from the players and showing that he is in control.

Gerrard suggests that Rafa very rarely singles players out for praise and will always demand more but this is not a dig at Rafa, he's simply saying that there can always be improvement and he wont accept players giving any less than 100%, he's a winner.

He's obviously a different type of manager to the likes of Houllier and Evans who made real bonds with players but i think Rafa will always try and treat players as equals. Apparantly he always tries to get players to bond and never lets particular nationalities form cliques.

Liverpool have reached a different level over the past few years and the personnel in the changing room has changed no end. Its very professional but there is no shortage of charachters. The likes of Riise, Crouch, Alonso, Garcia and Kuyt to name a few, seem to have big personalities and Rafa has never shyed away from bringing players in that could be a bit of a handful (i.e Bellamy, Pennant,Fowler).

I think Rafas approach to man-management is perhaps different to what players have been use to in the past but im a fan of Rafa and i do believe that ultimately, he will get the best out of players, (i.e Biscan).

by **PabloAimar** » Tue Jan 09, 2007 5:03 pm

rafa loves rotation...

as soon as he arrived, he made everyone sit at different tables everyday at meal times and when rooming for away games - he makes the players get close to each other but keeps a distance himself.

in the words of al pacino in 'the godfather'... "it aint personal, strictly business."

by **Bad Bob** » Tue Jan 09, 2007 7:07 pm

mattylfc wrote:I think Rafas approach to man-management is perhaps different to what players have been use to in the past but im a fan of Rafa and i do believe that ultimately, he will get the best out of players, (i.e Biscan).

You've hit on something here, mate. Rafa may seem like a cold fish to some who are used to a particular, charismatic approach to man-management. But, there's no arguing that he gets results out of many players that could be considered mediocre or worse. For instance, he helped the following earn (as in contribute, not just watch it from the bench) Champions League winner's medals:

1) Igor Biscan
2) Djimi Traore
3) Milan Baros
4) Jerzy Dudek
5) Vladimir Smicer
6) FSP
7) Djibril Cisse
8) Luis Garcia

These are players, I think it's fair to say, that have frustrated a lot of fans during their time at Liverpool and who many were happy to see/would be happy to see move on. Nonetheless, Rafa was able to get the very best out of them for at least a few key moments over the last couple of seasons, which I think speaks volumes for his man-management skills. So, while the gaffer may not be a father figure to any of the lads he certainly has the ability to get the best out of them, which is a rare talent indeed.

by **red37** » Tue Jan 09, 2007 7:10 pm

the right mentality?....Good points Lads.

by **Rafa D** » Wed Jan 10, 2007 12:46 pm

Bamaga man wrote:I've had my head stuck in Robbie Fowlers autobiography recently, not yet finnished reading it and to be quite frank not wanting it to end its an interesting read.

I've seen Ciggy's post on the ' sick and tired of controlling games ' thread. And TBH thats not the only excuse I'm sick of
we've had managers over the last decade or so and fans also, suggesting we were either ' unlucky' or from the fans ' dont worry it will come soon'. This Kind of jargen has been spoke like for the best part of 16 years. Fans on forums saying 'be patient, give them time'.

Seventeen years later, thats plenty of time in my book players have come and gone so to managers. And to look at where we are at now well, still no holy grail so are we any nearer in reality ?

After reading the majority of Robbie's book and trying not to be to biased towards him, as we know there are two sides to most stories. He obviously felt the club could have gone places before Roy Evan's departure. With the youth and talent he had coming through, he thought the future looked bright. We all know what happened next with the club and where it went. Well infact roughly the same in league in a positional sense to the eight years prior that, added on by the a few good cup triumphs.

Now I'm not going to go on and s'lag our previous managers off theres no point. But back when Houllier took over the players and funds he had available. That was the time to make ground on Arsenal and Man United. 140 million pounds later and it didnt happen, we never really got any nearer to the title. Looking back at that time in and around the 99-01 seasons we, I think missed the best chance to get back to the pinnacle of football. Rafa's job has been made a whole lot harder by the fact that there seems to be restraints in his spending of money, although in saying that, and I dont know what the figure is. I'd say he spent near enough 40-50 million pounds. Which tbh it seems in todays market at the top end of the table and stretched over three years almost, is pocket change to the likes of Mourinho and Fergie.

So while Chelsea, Arsenal and Man United have got stronger and stronger, we seemed to been left behind some what in terms of team performances and results and also financially. While this has gone on
Liverpool FC have been cast aside into the darkness and have had to sit back and watch our rivals bask in Premiership glory for almost two decades.
And to make ourselves try and feel that little bit better we find ourselves making excuses ( fans and managers too). This has gone on for a very long time now.

Harbouring on what Fowlers says in his book about managers having to essentially build up team spirit to even remotely give themselves a chnace of winning matches. Without that your a pi.ss weak side if nothing else. I honestly wonder what category he'd put Rafa under. Before I get into that, I'm not convinced yet that Rafa is the perfect tactician most people on here lead us to believe. Whether its formations, substitutions, personel he has been found wanting in the tactical side of his game. Then there is the transfer market, now alot of managers make mistakes in their signings so in that respect Rafa is no different.

But going back to the question, ' what would Robbie make of Rafa ?' Well for my money Rafa seems the typical 'foreign' manager. Devotes his time and effort into the finer details of the game, covers every aspect over and over. Works on diet and science in football and very thoughtful in his approach to the game. On the other hand though, and from what I can make of it from a few stories here and there is that he doesnt seem to have that link or connection with his playes, I may well be wrong.

Here is a list of managers Fowler basiclly gives and says who he got on with and who he didnt.

Got on with. Didnt get on with

Dalglish Houllier
Souness Hoddle
Roy Evans Erricksson
Terry Venables
Kevin Keegan

I havent read as far as his Leeds days or Man.C days but I'll bet my bottom dollar that he respected and got on with Stuart Pearce. But I couldnt wager a bet on what catergory he'd put Benitez under. The guys on the left a mostly well known for the " good man-management" skills that are vital to any team or club (apart from Souness maybe ).

This could be possibly Benitez biggest flaw, in his management skills. By the way this ISNT a Rafa out thread, more of a ' I'm bored and can I make some kind of thought provoking post thread'. And according to a proffesional footballer that ' team spirit ' is needed just as much as anything else in the game of football. So I'm just wondeing whether we're going to be carrying on with the same old excuses that we've used after every poor performance for the last seventeen years, for the foreseable future.

Bamaga Man you have raised some interesting points. I will reply when I am not too depressed :down:

Liverpool FC Forum

Questions and views - On the club and team.

Who is online