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View from the Kop

The Exodus set to begin at Anfield

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With the departure of Rafa Benitez as Liverpool manager, there will be many associated consequences both on and off the field relating to the futures of both playing and non-playing staff. Some can be placated but others are far more concerning:

Players:

Steven Gerrard – Uncertain about his future even before Benitez’s sacking. Will he wait to see who the club appoints as the new manager or will he finally give up the ghost of finally winning the Premier League with his hometown club? The temptation of linking up with Jose Mourinho and Xabi Alonso at Real Madrid maybe too hard to resist considering the state of things at Anfield on and off the pitch

Fernando Torres – Guillem Balague has said that the Spanish striker’s future is not linked to Benitez’s and I am inclined to believe that Rafa’s departure will not affect his decision on whether to stay or leave. He will want to see progress in the transfer market if he was to stay at the club and the new manager will need to convince him to continue on Merseyside. His options of returning to Spain look limited with Barcelona purchasing David Villa and so the most likely destinations would be either Italy or Chelsea if he was to leave Anfield.

Javier Mascherano – The most likely to leave Liverpool this summer for a whole host of reasons, the Argentinean has stalled on signing on a new contract until after the World Cup and has stated his allegiance to Rafa Benitez in the recent past. His wife and family are also keen to leave England for a Spanish speaking country and Barcelona could well make another bid for him.

Others – The futures of players such as Albert Riera, Yossi Benayoun and Ryan Babel are now up in the air. The new manager may deem all surplus to requirements or he could see them as integral to the rebuilding process that will need to take place at Anfield. In any case it will be a clean slate for all players at the club.

Staff:

Probably more significant than the players in some ways, this summer could see the largest exodus of non-playing staff in Liverpool’s recent history. Nearly all are Benitez appointees and may consider leaving, with Sammy Lee perhaps the only likely member of the coaching staff to stay. The large Spanish contingent are probably all considering their futures with first team coach Mauricio Pellegrino, goalkeeping coach Xavi Valero, fitness coach Paco Miguel, reserve team coach Antonio Gomez Perez and chief scout Eduardo Macia all likely to leave Anfield or move with Rafa Benitez wherever he goes.

The most concerning problem though, is the future of the Academy. The restructuring at Kirkby that took place last summer designed to improve the quality of youngsters coming through the Liverpool youth system maybe stopped in its tracks by the new manager as Rodolfo Borrell and Pep Segura may also consider their futures. They were tasked by Benitez to improve the local talent coming through the ranks and to replicate their success they had at Barcelona’s academy La Masia as much as possible. The entire project was designed to take years to accomplish, establishing a legacy where the first team could rely on a group of youngsters who were homegrown and had a passion for Liverpool football club. If Segura, Borrell as well as Frank McParland who planned the restructuring and reserve coach John McMahon also leave, what would happen to these ambitions? With Liverpool in such a bad financial state, we will need to rely on a youth academy capable of developing top class players. If this is abandoned, what consequences will there be for the club?

As you can see, if an exodus does take place this summer, both the club and the new manager will have to reconstruct the club from the bottom up. It’s going to be one hell of a task for anyone to take on.

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15 comments

  • samuel charles says:

    if they all go and if so then at least the club can do is hold out for a rip off prices,

    torres = 80 mill
    gerro = 45 mill
    javier = 40 mill
    babel = 9 mill
    yossi = 10 mill

    and im sorry lfc always have to over pay for other players they can start doing it for our huge names, it would be the same the other way round, if this happens then i only dread what would happen if no money yes ” no money was then put back asap into the whole team, if we sell all above then i want it all, every last penny back into the team.

    thats alot of money but whats the point of starting again when you already have 4 of the worlds best players there, if one had to go and i could pick one to generate cash then for me it would be mascherano.

    if the yanks sell torres or even both him and javier, there should be a f**king riot.

  • brush says:

    This sums up the short sightedness of the goons who now run the club. Losing Rafa was stupid, but not to take into account the ripple effect was reckless. If these idiots: Broughton, Purslow and Ayre think this will make the club more attractive to investors, then they are either deluded or completely incompetent; probably both.

  • Imran says:

    What dramatisation! The only exodus will be the owners, none of the senior players will leave as they will relish a new start under a new manager. Get your perspective back and support the club!

  • Phil says:

    This is a flawed article because it’s based on the assumption that the players didn’t want Rafa to go. Anyone who saw their faces at the last months of the season must question that. I think this has tied down Gerrard and Torres for one more season at least.

  • steve mcauley says:

    how do you know there’s not a new owner who has just been waiting for this regime to get rid of the clown and take all the flak? how would it look if the new owner’s first job was to sack a manager who is still regarded very highly by a significant number of fans (albeit a vast minority!)? you never know, there could be someone just about to start writing on a clean slate, i certainly hope so!

  • gaga says:

    Dont worry liverpool going to be taken over by berkshire hathaway and we’ll win the league like so many people have predicted over the last how many years. People have finally woken up to the fact Lfc are nothing more than an average team. Get used to it. I would have thought after 20 years of rubbish people would realise 😀

  • steve mcauley says:

    yes gaga, under bungling benny we HAVE been an average team but you have to concede we have some world-class individuals who, under the right manager, could be a fantastic team! with a couple of additions added to a super spine of reina, agger, skrtl, masch,SG and nando, with an attack minded manager we could dominate england and europe once again! and perhaps we could have if rafa had the balls to change his philosophy from one of not getting beaten to one of going out to win!

  • pete says:

    Any true fan would recognise the environment Rafa – and the players – have had to operate in. The two tumours have stripped a proud club of it’s dignity and even appointed a Chelsea season ticket holder to the Board. All those Rafa haters didn’t seem to think further than an hour ahead – what was going to happen to the bigger picture, who were we targeting as a replacement and who were we likely to get? And if Rafa was so bad why do the Champions of Europe want him. I don’t see Inter Milan, or Real Madrid trying to tempt Martin fucking O’Neal or Harry bung Redknapp to their clubs.
    There may be a new owner in the wings – if that owner has engineered a sacking of Rafa then they too are not to be trusted. Those two f***wits (H and G or Parry and Moores, take your pick) are an absolute f**king disgrace to humanity.

  • steve mcauley says:

    c’mon pete, enough with the ‘true fan’ s***e! being a fan doesn’t mean you have to blindly follow whoever is the manager! i admit rafa signed some brilliant players but, because of his negative tactics and playing them out of position, he never made a ‘team’ out of them and you must admit he was an absolutely crap man-manager

  • Hello…I come from Indonesia…we’re All Liverpundian Indonesia always hope that SG.8 & FT.9 must be STAYED at ANFIELD…You’ll Never Walk Alone

  • ianlt says:

    if you think 7th was bad wait till the end of next year we will be lucky to be in the top ten. our beloved Liverpool is in for a ruff ride and our only hope has been sacked. no one will take the lfc job with the ability to take us forward cos it is an impossible task. no cash players who want out and a back room staff just waiting to see were Rafa ends up. forget selling our club its not going to happen this year. and forget O’Neil he is not half the manege Rafa was. we need to open our eyes and stop blaming rafa it was not his fault he was mislead and lied to . o and i for one will always remember this day as the day lfc lost touch with its fans a Chelsea fan on the board what more can i say….!!!

  • Jack says:

    “All the senior players will stay once we have a new manager”? Absolute rubbish. When they see Hodgeson or O’neill walk in it will turn them right off. Any way it does not matter which manager we get. The point is there is no money for small buys let alone world class talent. Torres will no way stay if 3-4 great players are not brought in as he has stated. Nor Gerrard. Who will buy this club which is in such disarray with no truely world class manager and probably with a youth setup that is decimated? Mid-table and mickey mouse cup are all we can dream of until we sell. Its that simple.

  • Jay says:

    Everything’s being blown out of proportion!! – just a few weeks/months ago all the news was that those same players would want to move on if Rafa remained. Now all of a sudden, he moves on and we’re supposed to believe they’ll all immediately hand in transfer requests??

    Mascherano will more than likely move on (hopefully before Barca buy Fabregas), and will generate a significant amount of money to strengthen the team where quality players are at a premium (wings & striker), but that transfer has nothing to do with Benitez leaving.

    Torres will give us another year to show whether we’re on the right track or not, and has said throughout the season that he has signed with Liverpool FC, not with Rafa.
    Gerrard is coming to the end of his career and will have his head turned again, but will probably remain if we can show some sort of ambition with the managerial hire and our transfer targets.
    Benayoun & Riera will probably move on, but Rafa moving on does not make them more likely to leave – quite the opposite in fact. Besides at their age, the club is probably better off cashing in now anyways and looking for younger upgrades, as this is probably the last chance to get a significant fee for them.

    Same goes with Kuyt. He is probably the one player most tied with Benitez, but at his age and considering his ability, the club would do very well to come close to recouping the money spent on purchasing him

    Finally, Babel is probably looking forwards to a fresh start and an opportunity to kick-start his career, either with a new manager or a new club. I’m sure that he won’t be looking too longingly at Rafa’s back.

    As long as we don’t end up with some trash like Hughes in charge, the future is nowhere near as bleak as it’s made out to be!

  • Dan says:

    Not all ‘true’ Liverpool fans wear rosy Rafa goggles and spout continual myopic tripe. There is a large contingent of sensible, rational koppites that are being vastly underrepresented on this board. We’re not all burning another country’s flag and preaching some reverse-shanklyan armageddon. All this “end times,” “mid-table wilderness,” “eternal demise” pontificating is really getting nauseous and annoying. First of all, take a look a premier league standing trends and apply your brain. Teams often have a poor year and bounce back the next season by applying a bit of common sense and graft. Liverpool has a strong squad spine, where if players are properly nurtured, applied, and formulated, you could immediately get a lot more out of them. A top class manager like Hiddink (just one example) would get far more out of our present squad than Rafa did, just by playing players in their proper positions and applying tactics and formations that suit
    them. Such a manager would also not continually pulverize the team by making bizarre substitutions and hauling of performing players in preference for those that repeatedly play poorly. A class manager would make acute personnel decisions that would supplement the existing spine rather than detract from it. You wouldn’t get decisions like replacing Alonso with Lucas…. or selling on Crouch, Bellamy, Cisse, and Baros while keeping Ngog and Voronin as your only backup for Torres. A class manager would not habitually alienate players and upset natural team chemistry with displays of petulance. What is the point of buying a Robbie Keane type player – playing him out of positions (or on the bench) for three months – then cut-price selling him when he actually starts to score goals and gel with the team? Class managers don’t do this sort of thing – otherwise Henry and Cantona would have been flogged off before they made their mark in the premiership.
    Man-management skills are a necessary trait, especially with English players who can’t rely on technical precision all the time. In time, I hope that the IRWT brigade and the doom-merchants wake up to the fact that Rafa was simply lacking in many areas. The reason he is coveted by teams like Inter Milan is quite simply because he is much more suited to Serie A football and would probably do well there. He is defensive, cautious, and likes a slow, methodic, probing football – all elements that will keep him from winning an English premiership forever. The wallowing Rafa-lovers keep trotting out the line that “Gerrard and Torres will follow Rafa out of the club.” Were you watching any of the games towards the end of the season? Did Gerrard or Torres (or anyone else for that matter) look thrilled with the way Rafa managed the games? By paying Rafa off (he wasn’t going to leave folks!), we have actually invested in our future by bringing about the
    best scenario to where Gerrard and Torres (and others) will now probably stay. For all your black prophesy, you just can’t convince those of us that think for ourselves that Gerrard and Torres wouldn’t love to play for a more progressive, positive, attack-minded manager that doesn’t stubbornly keep making the same mistakes over and over again. Before you start playing the ingratitude card and bringing up Istanbul and Cardiff, let me tell you that there is no Liverpool fan that is ungrateful to Rafa or wishes him ill. But ask yourself honestly, was it Rafa’s tactics that won those two trophies on penalties – or was it a team that had to rise above Rafa’s deficiencies in fashioning a gameplan? This is not ingratitude but just pure honest reflection. Many will also cling to last year’s second place finish but just take a minute to analyze it properly. We played the Rafa way for the first half of the season and fell behind due to too many draws. It
    wasn’t until we took the shackles off, threw caution to the wind, and proceeded to play in the most un-rafalike manner that we began to become a threat. But did Rafa learn anything from that going into the next season? No, he weakened the squad and reverted back to his failed approach once again. The simple fact is, Rafa had to go and probably should have gone much sooner. His effectiveness in the premiership is long gone and the squad is going backwards. A progressive new manager can come in, buy a couple of smart wide players and a decent forward to work with Torres, and this team could make big positive strides next season. Today was not a black day for LIverpool football club. With a sensible new managerial appointment, some clever acquisitions, this team could attract new ownership sooner rather than later. Stop listening to all the knee-jerk soundbites and apply some reason.

  • boris says:

    dan,

    what rubbish. its obvious that torres works best unless with a worldclass strike partner. all have left because of that. crouch wasnt able to work well with torres and left because of it. so dont go saying that players should have been kept, because we all know there was NO MONEY there to start off with, so other purchases needed to be funded with sales. you think we even have the wage allowance to keep them on the books just as back up and theyll be happy with it? rafa was the one that brought crouch in you fucking idiot, he wanted crouch to stay. crouch got offered first team football and a higher pay at portsmouth. what a fucking idiot you are, dan.

    its fans like YOU that disrupt the club. all you do is cause cynicism in the media, and the media decides to feed you more excrement and thats how you people live.

    why dont you people criticise ferguson for spending all that money on the likes of nani (who was rubbish until 2 months ago) and anderson? or maybe the djemba djembas? OR HEY LETS SAY BERBATOV AND VERON? how about that, those two were more than 20 million pounds, veron broke the fucking bank. and yet we call a player who spent half the season trying to regain fitness a flop (aquilani)

    so you can see, it was YOUR expectations that we should be winning the premierleague that drove you to require rafa to properly replace alonso. and as a result of your dissapointment, you vent your frustration through calling players in their first season of the premierleague a flop.

    youre so short term oriented that you dont even see the merit in that rafa brought in an amazing player that nobody saw. why not say, WELL DONE RAFA, THANKS FOR BRINGING ALONSO TO US.

    and THANKS FOR TORRES, THANKS FOR TAKING A CHANCE ON TORRES AND MASCHERANO WHEN PEOPLE SAID THEY WOULD BE FLOPS AND WASTES OF MONEY.

    all world class players, that rafa took a chance on. how many worldclass players has david moyes uncovered?

    maybe youre the one with goggles on, dan, ever thought of that? maybe youre the one who makes kneejerk reactions to situations because youre so irrationale about the concept of steady growth.

    the point is, the kneejerk reactions are not kneejerks. these are owners who said the week before that rafas job was safe. who said that he would have money to spend. only for them to LIE and sack the man.

    how can you possibly trust two men who are so amoral as to price the club at 600m-800m so they can make the return, just to cover their asses for all the bankruptcies theyve caused in the US over the past year?

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