Don’t Blame Benitez

This is going to be a crap column. Sorry. The conclusions derived from its content are as wayward as a Paul Konchesky cross, the gags here aren’t good enough to compete with the likes of Barney Ronay and the cadence, well that’s just all over the place, the place, the place. It’s not my fault though. It’s the fault of my predecessor. Sure, I hit the keyboard and made the words, but the last bloke? Well, he was just awful.

Does that make sense? Well, it makes as much sense as blaming Rafa Benitez for Liverpool’s miserable start to the season. After all, Roy Hodgson signed three of the men who failed against Everton, and that number would have been higher had it not been for the unavoidable absence of Christian Poulsen. But ignoring personnel, shape, style and logic, pundits have been lining up to pin it all on the deposed Spaniard, poring over his failures with glee, pausing only to shine spotlights at Ryan Babel while bellowing, “£11.5m! What the hell was he thinking?” at passers-by.

I am no apologist for Benitez. The day after he left Anfield, I wrote a column that began with the words, “Rafa Benitez deserved to be sacked.” The very next day a number of angry emails arrived, the majority of which were typed in block capitals. But I stand by my point.

Liverpool hadn’t just finished 7^th, they had been bombed out of the Champions League in a group stage seeded for their benefit. To make matters worse, they were knocked out of the FA Cup by Reading. At home. In a replay. They only qualified for the Europa League because the Football Association refused to run the risk of Portsmouth having their credit card refused at the airport. By any criteria, with the best will in the world, this was the most disastrous season Liverpool had experienced since the Souness era. Two decades ago, it would have meant the bullet. In these hysterical times it’s only a wonder Benitez wasn’t sacked sooner.

Not that he had much of a chance by the end. He was doomed the moment it emerged his American paymasters had been hitching up their skirts and whistling provocatively at Jurgen Klinsmann. Undermined and humiliated, he was a dead man walking. To make matters worse, the ruinous interest repayments from the deceitful leveraged buy-out robbed him of the ability to strengthen his squad. His final acquisitions were signed for transfer fees that wouldn’t have looked out of place in Kenny Dalglish’s day. But the damage was done before the arrival of Tom Hicks and George Gillett.

Benitez was never able to lift Liverpool to a level where they could consistently challenge the big guns. Xabi Alonso and Luis Garcia were superb early signings. Pepe Reina, a year later, was even better. Fernando Torres, not so obviously brilliant as people now make out, arrived in 2007, as did the disagreeable, but effective Javier Mascherano. Five players who would have challenged for a place in the Manchester United first team. Where are the others? Daniel Agger, Dirk Kuyt, Peter Crouch and Alvaro Arbeloa were all good professionals, but as Yossi Benayoun proved this summer, Liverpool’s better players would only be worth a place on Chelsea’s bench.

In erring in the transfer market, Benitez is hardly alone. But he did have an advantage that only a handful of other managers in England shared. He never had to deal with players demanding moves to bigger clubs. He never lost his stars to the European elite. He always had money to spend and, regardless of what Sir Alex Ferguson thinks, there has always been value in the transfer market. And, until the arrival of Hicks and Gillett, he had time. Time enough to forge a squad better than the one that finished seventh. Time enough to build a squad that could have been better insulated against the changing conditions.

Nevertheless, he is a fine manager. The Liverpool side that triumphed in Istanbul were comfortably the worst set of players to lift that trophy since Steaua Bucharest in 1986. Gerard Houllier was right. They were, for the most part, his team and he’s welcome to them. It will be many years before players as mediocre as Igor Biscan and Milan Baros bat so far beyond their average. Benitez won that trophy though, driving his team through the knock-out rounds with tactics that frustrated and defeated some of Europe’s biggest names. He did it the hard way and deserves his place in history. The last tilt at the title was impressive as well, especially given that Torres, regarded by some as one of only two decent players in the side, was absent for so much of the season. In the end though, Benitez couldn’t keep it up. His squad wasn’t good enough to win the title. Or challenge for it. They were good enough to finish seventh.

Which brings us back to Hodgson. He did not inherit relegation fodder. He inherited a seventh placed team. He added some names, he shed a few. He imposed his tactics and his ideals. It takes time to change the mentality of a club, but Hodgson has moved quickly. In a matter of months he has taken under-performing disappointments and turned them into screamingly awful empty shirts. This isn’t entirely his fault. He has endured as many distractions and pitfalls as his predecessor. But it is his responsibility.

Blaming Benitez isn’t just wrong, it’s self-destructive. It obscures the real reasons for Liverpool’s problems. It provides an excuse for failure and footballers rarely need to be asked twice to take one of those. Liverpool are crap because they play crap football. Granted, they haven’t played glorious football since the days of Roy Evans, but good God in heaven, they were never this bad. They lump the ball artlessly into the sky and hope that when it comes down, it lands somewhere near Torres. If that doesn’t work, they try it again. And again. And again.

Liverpool are crap because their well-remunerated players are offering up crap performances. Steven Gerrard can pass the ball far more accurately than he did on Sunday. Joe Cole can be more incisive, more daring and more dangerous. Lucas is a decent player, he really, really is. But he wasn’t this weekend. The list of despair goes on and on and on and on. These men need to stand up, take a look at the badge on their shirt and realise that they cannot continue to be so second-rate.

But tactics and motivation are the province of the manager. Not last season’s manager, the current manager. Hodgson has had to deal with boardroom uncertainty and a home crowd who were never entirely sure about him in the first place. This was not an easy assignment and I don’t envy him it for a moment. But it is his job.

For finishing seventh last season, blame Benitez. For bobbing about in the relegation zone, blame Hodgson. This isn’t politics, you can’t blame everything on the previous administration. Liverpool need to face up to the real reasons for their failure.