Rafa Benitez
The race for the final Champions League place
The race for the fourth Champions League spot took another twist this weekend as Everton slumped to a defeat at Craven Cottage as Liverpool impressed in a home win against Reading.
Liverpool now have a three point cushion over their Merseyside neighbours with goal difference also being in their favour but there will be no complacency [...]
Fernando Torres: The best finisher on the globe?
Fernando Torres has proven to be worth every penny as Liverpool’s search for a prolific forward came to an end with the Spaniard’s entrance. Yet after a trophyless season, Torres needs to help guide the club to Premier League glory in 2009 if his time at Anfield is to be heralded a success.
Five Things: Defending, Conceding, Scoring, Superstars, Refereeing
1. Liverpool’s dead ball deficiencies
While Aston Villa are the masters of scoring from dead ball situations, Liverpool are the worst at defending them. 14 of the 20 goals conceded by Rafa Benítez’s side have derived from set-piece situations, a defensive problem that has been a recurrent worry through the season and continued at Bolton on [...]
Wounded Liverpool keep up their Champions League love affair
If you’d believed all you’d read in the past couple of days, it wasn’t worth Liverpool showing up to face Internazionale tonight.
After all, having seen their Premiership challenge fail to last the winter (again), and then their FA Cup ambitions go up in smoke at the hands of Barnsley at the weekend, a game against [...]
Europe or bust for Rafa
It’s a familiar tale for Rafa Benitez and Liverpool.
Once again, Benitez finds himself in the position of relying on Europe to redeem his club’s season.
It worked magnificently in 2004/05, and almost did so again last season. But, it is hard to escape the feeling that, if Inter Milan overcome Liverpool in the European Cup, Benitez’s [...]
The chase for fourth spot hots up as underdogs lurk
To older football fans, the idea of the race for fourth place being as interesting, or as important, as the title chase or the relegation dogfight is fundamentally absurd. After all, as Bill Shankly once said “if you are first you are first, if you are second you are nowhere”.
But this season one of the [...]
Uefa Cup success will save face for Benítez and his domestic failings, but only in the short-run
Winning the Champions League in his first year ensured Rafa Benítez would join the list of great Liverpool managers while also assuring supporters that he was the right man to lead the club in consistently challenging for major honours at home and abroad. In the subsequent two years, just the FA Cup has been added [...]
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