Rafa Benítez (now unemployed)

[TRon]

The only reason I think we might stay up is Rafa. That's all there is to it for me. I can't see any other manager coming in and keeping this shower of shit up.

[Guest Howaythetoon]

I don’t want to get into a debate about who would do better, but the way we attempt to play football makes it’s extremely hard for the players to get results because we always try and contain the opposition and surrender possession far too easily. Brighton looked extremely comfortable and on the ball played the much better football. If we are to blame our season on having shit footballers, Rafas tactics and way of playing is basically like tightening that rope...

[xLiaaamx]

Signing no one and keeping Daryl would have been better than buying Joselu. Plus he was furious when the board didn't want to buy Joselu for him. Could have found Umpteen strikers in europe for 5 million that have more talent than him.

[Guest reefatoon]

Love everything about Rafa until the 90 minutes of football at home. We look shit scared to get out of our own half, and set up like that to not concede, without even trying to take a game to the opposition. Awful to watch and we need to sort that out at home like, as it is nowhere near good enough.

[TRon]

It is staggering how people choose to ignore that Rafa was given pretty much enough to slap together this dog s*** squad. Most of the players really are that bad.

 

Rafa truly f***ed up when he didn't go to the ATM to get money for Aguero this summer.

 

One thing to critique his decisions, but some of you have taken dip s*** to a dizzying level.

Funny how Hughton didn't get Aguero money or a cool 50 million to spend in their promotion season and Brighton are still doing well isn't it.

 

Rafa is under performing, and I hope he still turns it around but, things just seem to be getting worse rather than better.

 

They also didn't literally lose 13/14 first team players from the 2015/16 either though. We had about 10 players remaining after all those transfers so had to buy at least the same number of players in the cope with the extra 8 or 11 league games in the Championship. Brighton's team had been geared for promotion for years and the likes of Dunk would have easily been worth £15m, Knockaert the same (in this market), Dale Stephens £10m or so, whereas the bulk of our signings ranged from £2.5m to £5.5m, bar 2 notable exceptions.

 

Pretty much all our quality was sold to generate that £90m - £55m was put back in to sign 14 players - an average of £3.9m per player and you just need look at transfers in that league from this season to see that that figure really isn't that much - Assombolonga £15, Neves £16m, Rhodes £10m, Braithwaite £10m etc.

 

Brighton were at least equal to us last season, if not better as they were 7 clear with 3 games to go once their bottom line of promotion was secured. Make no mistake, if 1 was promoted and the other 4 went in the playoffs rather than 2 automatically, then we wouldn't have won the league, so we were at least equal and for whatever reason, their transfers this season have been better - Ryan has made a big difference, Davy Propper. We had Atsu last year, Joselu and Manq have arguably made us worse, Murphy non existent, so you could argue we are actually even worse than we were last season as only Merino has come in and had a decent impact.

 

Is location a problem, are we more restricted on wages (really can't see Joselu, Manquillo and Murphy being on more than £100k between them)? But I can guarantee if Rafa had his way, he wouldn't have went to Mike and said 'Mike, whatever you do, please please give me that Joselu lad who can't get a look in at Stoke, he'll make a hell of a difference".

 

We've had a bunch of top championship / fringe Premier League players bundled together in one window and while that cope have coped had 3 or 4 players been brought in at £15m-20m a skelp to add a bit of quality to a try hard but limited group, but we all know that didn't happen, so I'd argue that we are at a worse level than Brighton now.

 

People need to realise we are literally operating on a bottom 3 to 4 budget now (far lower than the likes of Everton, Leicester, Palace, West Ham, Watford etc) and if you were born after 1980 or so (which a large chunk of us on here will be) then for the first time in your life this is the first time that has happened - forget the top 6, we are miles behind 75% of the league. 

 

Well said.

[triggs]

We should've kept Graham Carr

[Carlito]

It is staggering how people choose to ignore that Rafa was given pretty much enough to slap together this dog s*** squad. Most of the players really are that bad.

 

Rafa truly f***ed up when he didn't go to the ATM to get money for Aguero this summer.

 

One thing to critique his decisions, but some of you have taken dip s*** to a dizzying level.

Funny how Hughton didn't get Aguero money or a cool 50 million to spend in their promotion season and Brighton are still doing well isn't it.

 

Rafa is under performing, and I hope he still turns it around but, things just seem to be getting worse rather than better.

 

They also didn't literally lose 13/14 first team players from the 2015/16 either though. We had about 10 players remaining after all those transfers so had to bring in at least the same number of players to cope with the extra 8 (or 11) league games in the Championship. Brighton's team had been geared for promotion for years and the likes of Dunk would have easily been worth £15m, Knockaert the same (in this market), Dale Stephens £10m or so, whereas the bulk of our signings ranged from £2.5m to £5.5m, bar 2 notable exceptions.

 

Pretty much all our quality was sold to generate that £90m - £55m was put back in to sign 14 players - an average of £3.9m per player and you just need look at transfers in that league from this season to see that that figure really isn't that much - Assombolonga £15, Neves £16m, Rhodes £10m, Braithwaite £10m etc.

 

Brighton were at least equal to us last season, if not better as they were 7 clear with 3 games to go once their bottom line of promotion was secured. Make no mistake, if 1 was promoted and the other 4 went in the playoffs rather than 2 automatically, then we wouldn't have won the league, so we were at least equal and for whatever reason, their transfers this season have been better - Ryan has made a big difference, Davy Propper. We had Atsu last year, Joselu and Manq have arguably made us worse, Murphy non existent, so you could argue we are actually even worse than we were last season as only Merino has come in and had a decent impact.

 

Is location a problem, are we more restricted on wages (really can't see Joselu, Manquillo and Murphy being on more than £100k between them)? But I can guarantee if Rafa had his way, he wouldn't have went to Mike and said 'Mike, whatever you do, please please give me that Joselu lad who can't get a look in at Stoke, he'll make a hell of a difference".

 

We've had a bunch of top championship / fringe Premier League players bundled together in one window and while that cope have coped had 3 or 4 players been brought in at £15m-20m a skelp to add a bit of quality to a try hard but limited group, but we all know that didn't happen, so I'd argue that we are at a worse level than Brighton now.

 

People need to realise we are literally operating on a bottom 3 to 4 budget now (far lower than the likes of Everton, Leicester, Palace, West Ham, Watford etc) and if you were born after 1980 or so (which a large chunk of us on here will be) then for the first time in your life this is the first time that has happened - forget the top 6, we are miles behind 75% of the league. 

 

well said.

[Andy84]

In the space of a week we’re back here 

 

After 8-9 games whatever in a row losing we’ve got  4 points from 3, today was shit mind but it is what it is.  Shit today aye but we live to fight another day

[Vinny Green Balls]

In the space of a week we’re back here 

 

After 8-9 games whatever in a row losing we’ve got  4 points from 3, today was s*** mind but it is what it is.  s*** today aye but we live to fight another day

.

 

People.just brave enough to tell it how it is.

[Guest ElCid]

It is staggering how people choose to ignore that Rafa was given pretty much enough to slap together this dog s*** squad. Most of the players really are that bad.

 

Rafa truly f***ed up when he didn't go to the ATM to get money for Aguero this summer.

 

One thing to critique his decisions, but some of you have taken dip s*** to a dizzying level.

Funny how Hughton didn't get Aguero money or a cool 50 million to spend in their promotion season and Brighton are still doing well isn't it.

 

Rafa is under performing, and I hope he still turns it around but, things just seem to be getting worse rather than better.

 

They also didn't literally lose 13/14 first team players from the 2015/16 either though. We had about 10 players remaining after all those transfers so had to bring in at least the same number of players to cope with the extra 8 (or 11) league games in the Championship. Brighton's team had been geared for promotion for years and the likes of Dunk would have easily been worth £15m, Knockaert the same (in this market), Dale Stephens £10m or so, whereas the bulk of our signings ranged from £2.5m to £5.5m, bar 2 notable exceptions.

 

Pretty much all our quality was sold to generate that £90m - £55m was put back in to sign 14 players - an average of £3.9m per player and you just need look at transfers in that league from this season to see that that figure really isn't that much - Assombolonga £15, Neves £16m, Rhodes £10m, Braithwaite £10m etc.

 

Brighton were at least equal to us last season, if not better as they were 7 clear with 3 games to go once their bottom line of promotion was secured. Make no mistake, if 1 was promoted and the other 4 went in the playoffs rather than 2 automatically, then we wouldn't have won the league, so we were at least equal and for whatever reason, their transfers this season have been better - Ryan has made a big difference, Davy Propper. We had Atsu last year, Joselu and Manq have arguably made us worse, Murphy non existent, so you could argue we are actually even worse than we were last season as only Merino has come in and had a decent impact.

 

Is location a problem, are we more restricted on wages (really can't see Joselu, Manquillo and Murphy being on more than £100k between them)? But I can guarantee if Rafa had his way, he wouldn't have went to Mike and said 'Mike, whatever you do, please please give me that Joselu lad who can't get a look in at Stoke, he'll make a hell of a difference".

 

We've had a bunch of top championship / fringe Premier League players bundled together in one window and while that cope have coped had 3 or 4 players been brought in at £15m-20m a skelp to add a bit of quality to a try hard but limited group, but we all know that didn't happen, so I'd argue that we are at a worse level than Brighton now.

 

People need to realise we are literally operating on a bottom 3 to 4 budget now (far lower than the likes of Everton, Leicester, Palace, West Ham, Watford etc) and if you were born after 1980 or so (which a large chunk of us on here will be) then for the first time in your life this is the first time that has happened - forget the top 6, we are miles behind 75% of the league. 

 

When Keegan took over and in a far worse position he bought players he thought could get us out of the league but would also make an impact in the premier league and the rest is history. Don’t think that happened last year and compounded by the fact that Ashley is a cunt we have signed another set of in the main championship standard players.

[Guest Howaythetoon]

You have to ask are we playing to our max under Rafa? All I see is a team that sit too deep, surrender possession, barely string 3 passes together and look toothless up front who play with no cohesion or any joy de vivre whatsoever. But we have a bit of shape, we look organised and we work hard... say that to the table. I won’t lie but Rafa has seriously pissed me off today after that first half shambles against Man City with the way he set about containing the mighty Brighton and with our lack of urgency or threat. Keep blaming the players though...

[Lush Vlad]

To those saying don’t sign Joselu. It was desperation. Mitro is a basket case and has clearly not been fancied much by Rafa. I’d still personally liked to have seen him given a chance, but there you go.

 

Loads of question marks around Gayle and still are. Is he good enough at this level? Can he play up top on his own (no), will he ever trust his own hamstrings again?

 

So Rafa should have kept Daryl Murphy until late into the window and then not signed anyone else?

 

Our striking options were dire before and they still are. I put this more down to Rafa actually trusting the fat twat to keep his word and back him. Instead we have ended up with squad filler and panic buys.

 

But somehow, amazingly, after all these years of seeing how Ashley operates. Some fans are still incapable of realising what the obese slimeball is all about and are putting the bargain bin shit signings on the manager. Wow, just wow.

[Big Geordie]

Rafa "We didn't play as well as we had wanted - but we did try to push forward more in the 2nd half. Doesn't know about incoming transfers - makes it difficult, so is concentrating on Stoke on Monday. Lack of creativity today, but we defended well and restricted Brighton. Wants players to be fresh for Stoke, hence making all of those changes against Man City"

 

Hard to gauge his demeanor as I was listening on the radio.

[Carlito]

To those saying don’t sign Joselu. It was desperation. Mitro is a basket case and has clearly not been fancied much by Rafa. I’d still personally liked to have seen him given a chance, but there you go.

 

Loads of question marks around Gayle and still are. Is he good enough at this level? Can he play up top on his own (no), will he ever trust his own hamstrings again?

 

So Rafa should have kept Daryl Murphy until late into the window and then not signed anyone else?

 

Our striking options were dire before and they still are. I put this more down to Rafa actually trusting the fat t*** to keep his word and back him. Instead we have ended up with squad filler and panic buys.

 

But somehow, amazingly, after all these years of seeing how Ashley operates. Some fans are still incapable of realising what the obese slimeball is all about and are putting the bargain bin s*** signings on the manager. Wow, just wow.

 

Exactly. Ashley has screwed over everyone he's brought in.

[hoppaz]

Rafa will know we are relegation material so first thing he will want is not to concede and perhaps nick a goal at the end as we were doing earlier in the season to win games. A draw is still a point so we need to pick up these a long with some wins and our goal difference could be key come end of the season. If we just lose and lose we will go down so best to go out and get draws and perhaps wins to see us through.

 

We had Liverpool on the ropes towards the end and Man City too so today the players let Rafa down. The front two and wingers were shockingly bad. Shelvey when he came on had to basically tell our strikers to move in to space when he could have played them in.

[Guest Howaythetoon]

Push forward? 85 minutes on the clock and the ball breaks free and Shelvey our best passer gets on the ball and looks up and NOTHING, no forward movement,  no urgency, no attempt to break away from the chains that are holding us back, that all important clean sheet and staying in the game making sure the opposition don’t breach our defence. Cheers Rafa for the point.

[nemtizz]

The faint hope I have is that Rafa knows the takeover is happening and that he's doing anything and everything to get points on the board with this dreadful group of players, most of who he doesn't trust, before signing players in Jan.

[wormy]

It is staggering how people choose to ignore that Rafa was given pretty much enough to slap together this dog s*** squad. Most of the players really are that bad.

 

Rafa truly f***ed up when he didn't go to the ATM to get money for Aguero this summer.

 

One thing to critique his decisions, but some of you have taken dip s*** to a dizzying level.

Funny how Hughton didn't get Aguero money or a cool 50 million to spend in their promotion season and Brighton are still doing well isn't it.

 

Rafa is under performing, and I hope he still turns it around but, things just seem to be getting worse rather than better.

 

They also didn't literally lose 13/14 first team players from the 2015/16 either though. We had about 10 players remaining after all those transfers so had to bring in at least the same number of players to cope with the extra 8 (or 11) league games in the Championship. Brighton's team had been geared for promotion for years and the likes of Dunk would have easily been worth £15m, Knockaert the same (in this market), Dale Stephens £10m or so, whereas the bulk of our signings ranged from £2.5m to £5.5m, bar 2 notable exceptions.

 

Pretty much all our quality was sold to generate that £90m - £55m was put back in to sign 14 players - an average of £3.9m per player and you just need look at transfers in that league from this season to see that that figure really isn't that much - Assombolonga £15, Neves £16m, Rhodes £10m, Braithwaite £10m etc.

 

Brighton were at least equal to us last season, if not better as they were 7 clear with 3 games to go once their bottom line of promotion was secured. Make no mistake, if 1 was promoted and the other 4 went in the playoffs rather than 2 automatically, then we wouldn't have won the league, so we were at least equal and for whatever reason, their transfers this season have been better - Ryan has made a big difference, Davy Propper. We had Atsu last year, Joselu and Manq have arguably made us worse, Murphy non existent, so you could argue we are actually even worse than we were last season as only Merino has come in and had a decent impact.

 

Is location a problem, are we more restricted on wages (really can't see Joselu, Manquillo and Murphy being on more than £100k between them)? But I can guarantee if Rafa had his way, he wouldn't have went to Mike and said 'Mike, whatever you do, please please give me that Joselu lad who can't get a look in at Stoke, he'll make a hell of a difference".

 

We've had a bunch of top championship / fringe Premier League players bundled together in one window and while that cope have coped had 3 or 4 players been brought in at £15m-20m a skelp to add a bit of quality to a try hard but limited group, but we all know that didn't happen, so I'd argue that we are at a worse level than Brighton now.

 

People need to realise we are literally operating on a bottom 3 to 4 budget now (far lower than the likes of Everton, Leicester, Palace, West Ham, Watford etc) and if you were born after 1980 or so (which a large chunk of us on here will be) then for the first time in your life this is the first time that has happened - forget the top 6, we are miles behind 75% of the league. 

 

When Keegan took over and in a far worse position he bought players he thought could get us out of the league but would also make an impact in the premier league and the rest is history. Don’t think that happened last year and compounded by the fact tha

 

Yes. The footballing landscape allows us to replicate that on our budget.

[Superior Acuña]

100%.

 

Without him, there is no point.

[Jackie Broon]

What does this fella have to do before people start realising a lot of the issues we are having is down to him

 

For me, he would have to travel back in time ten years and alter the course of history resulting in an owner that runs the club in an intelligent, professional manner, maximising its commercial revenue and allowing that to be invested back into the playing staff.

 

Who exactly do you think would do better with this current squad? Pardew? McClaren? Kinnear? Carver? That is the quality of alternatives under Ashley.

[Mr Logic]

It is staggering how people choose to ignore that Rafa was given pretty much enough to slap together this dog s*** squad. Most of the players really are that bad.

 

Rafa truly f***ed up when he didn't go to the ATM to get money for Aguero this summer.

 

One thing to critique his decisions, but some of you have taken dip s*** to a dizzying level.

Funny how Hughton didn't get Aguero money or a cool 50 million to spend in their promotion season and Brighton are still doing well isn't it.

 

Rafa is under performing, and I hope he still turns it around but, things just seem to be getting worse rather than better.

 

They also didn't literally lose 13/14 first team players from the 2015/16 either though. We had about 10 players remaining after all those transfers so had to bring in at least the same number of players to cope with the extra 8 (or 11) league games in the Championship. Brighton's team had been geared for promotion for years and the likes of Dunk would have easily been worth £15m, Knockaert the same (in this market), Dale Stephens £10m or so, whereas the bulk of our signings ranged from £2.5m to £5.5m, bar 2 notable exceptions.

 

Pretty much all our quality was sold to generate that £90m - £55m was put back in to sign 14 players - an average of £3.9m per player and you just need look at transfers in that league from this season to see that that figure really isn't that much - Assombolonga £15, Neves £16m, Rhodes £10m, Braithwaite £10m etc.

 

Brighton were at least equal to us last season, if not better as they were 7 clear with 3 games to go once their bottom line of promotion was secured. Make no mistake, if 1 was promoted and the other 4 went in the playoffs rather than 2 automatically, then we wouldn't have won the league, so we were at least equal and for whatever reason, their transfers this season have been better - Ryan has made a big difference, Davy Propper. We had Atsu last year, Joselu and Manq have arguably made us worse, Murphy non existent, so you could argue we are actually even worse than we were last season as only Merino has come in and had a decent impact.

 

Is location a problem, are we more restricted on wages (really can't see Joselu, Manquillo and Murphy being on more than £100k between them)? But I can guarantee if Rafa had his way, he wouldn't have went to Mike and said 'Mike, whatever you do, please please give me that Joselu lad who can't get a look in at Stoke, he'll make a hell of a difference".

 

We've had a bunch of top championship / fringe Premier League players bundled together in one window and while we could have coped had 3 or 4 proven players been brought in at £15m-20m apiece to add a bit of quality to a committed but ultimately limited group, but we all know that didn't happen, so I'd argue that we are at a worse level than Brighton now.

 

People need to realise we are literally operating on a bottom 3 to 4 budget now (far lower than the likes of Everton, Leicester, Palace, West Ham, Watford etc) and if you were born after 1980 or so (which a large chunk of us on here will be) then for the first time in your life this is the first time that has happened - forget the top 6, we are miles behind 75% of the league.

 

Excellent post!

[Guest ElCid]

To those saying don’t sign Joselu. It was desperation. Mitro is a basket case and has clearly not been fancied much by Rafa. I’d still personally liked to have seen him given a chance, but there you go.

 

Loads of question marks around Gayle and still are. Is he good enough at this level? Can he play up top on his own (no), will he ever trust his own hamstrings again?

 

So Rafa should have kept Daryl Murphy until late into the window and then not signed anyone else?

 

Our striking options were dire before and they still are. I put this more down to Rafa actually trusting the fat t*** to keep his word and back him. Instead we have ended up with squad filler and panic buys.

 

But somehow, amazingly, after all these years of seeing how Ashley operates. Some fans are still incapable of realising what the obese slimeball is all about and are putting the bargain bin s*** signings on the manager. Wow, just wow.

 

If you sign shit you get shit doesn’t matter how you mask it that’s what happens. But as I said not even giving Mitrovich a look in is criminal. Joselu is woeful and yet gets more game time than just about anyone.

[Vinny Green Balls]

If you have pennies to spend, you get shit.

[UncleBingo]

To those saying don’t sign Joselu. It was desperation. Mitro is a basket case and has clearly not been fancied much by Rafa. I’d still personally liked to have seen him given a chance, but there you go.

 

Loads of question marks around Gayle and still are. Is he good enough at this level? Can he play up top on his own (no), will he ever trust his own hamstrings again?

 

So Rafa should have kept Daryl Murphy until late into the window and then not signed anyone else?

 

Our striking options were dire before and they still are. I put this more down to Rafa actually trusting the fat t*** to keep his word and back him. Instead we have ended up with squad filler and panic buys.

 

But somehow, amazingly, after all these years of seeing how Ashley operates. Some fans are still incapable of realising what the obese slimeball is all about and are putting the bargain bin s*** signings on the manager. Wow, just wow.

 

If you sign s*** you get s*** doesn’t matter how you mask it that’s what happens. But as I said not even giving Mitrovich a look in is criminal. Joselu is woeful and yet gets more game time than just about anyone.

 

Joselu was one of our better players today mind.

[Dave]

When Keegan took over, 25 years ago? How is that possibly a relevant comparison?