Alrick

Does Rafa Deserve Credit for Chelsea’s “Success”?

Recently, I have heard some Chelsea fans say that interim manager Rafa Benitez deserves credit for inspiring comebacks against Manchester United and Steaua Bucharest. It’s obvious he isn’t liked by the majority of Chelsea fans, but is this new found credit he’s receiving from some Chelsea fans merited? Let’s take a look at his “success” as a Chelsea manager which is apparently earning him some credit…

  • Rafa’s “success” has him as the second worst Chelsea manager since the 90’s – With a winning percentage of 51.6%, Rafa has the second worst winning percentage of any Chelsea manager since 1998. Only AVB with a 47.5% winning percentage is worse. I could be wrong, but last time I checked success was measured by wins and losses, not by beating up on a weak team like Aston Villa by eight goals.
  • Rafa’s limited “success” isn’t coming against equal or better opposition – He has failed to win all 3 matches against opposition from Manchester and hasn’t played Spurs yet, meaning Rafa has ZERO wins against teams with more points against Chelsea in the Premier League table. He’ll have another chance against Man United on April 1st.
  • Rafa’s “squad rotation” puts Chelsea in poor situations – As an example, Rafa’s decision to start Yossi Benayoun in a difficult environment such as Stadionul Steaua (Romania) over Juan Mata was puzzling to say the least. It would have made much more sense to start a key player like Mata away from home and hope for a result so he can be rested for the second leg. His substitutions have continued to defy spectator logic all season and although the Chelsea fixture list is exhaustive, he continues to bench important players and leave substitutions until very late in the game (or not at all).
  • Rafa’s unwillingness to change tactics makes Chelsea predictable – His stubborn nature related to his 4-2-3-1 tactics have made Chelsea predictable – with so many fixtures there is A LOT of footage for teams to watch and develop strategies on how to exploit the weaknesses of Rafa’s tactics. The Capital One Cup matches against Swansea immediately come to mind, where they forced Chelsea into sloppy possession play and created chances on the counter attack.
  • Rafa’s “success” has Chelsea with ZERO trophies and favored to win ZERO trophies – Despite having the opportunity to win more trophies in a single season than in any other season in club history, the Chelsea trophy cabinet for the 2012-2013 season currently sits empty. Outside of the Champions League and Community Shield, Rafa has failed to win the Club World Championship and Capital One Cup during his time with Chelsea. He has taken a team with title aspirations in the Premier League and lost so many points that the club may not even qualify for the Champions League next season. Finally, Chelsea will have to overcome the odds to win their two remaining trophies, the FA Cup and the Europa League (Spurs are now favored to win the Europa League according to some books after today’s draw). 0 for 7? It’s very realistic…

In short, I fail to understand how or why Rafa deserves credit for the “success” of Chelsea because of the expectations of the club. Chelsea, with world class talent (and the wages which come with it), are expected to win against modern cup minnows such as Brentford, Steaua, and Sparta – yet these opponents have pushed Chelsea into uncomfortable waters due to a manager who has continued to make poor squad decisions and refuses to change a “strategy” which has him as one of the worst Chelsea managers in the modern era. Has Chelsea really reached the point where after winning the Champions League last season we are praising one of the worst mangers the club has had in a decade and a half for narrowly defeating European minnows? Apparently so…

Alrick

4 Reasons Why Rafa Benitez Isn’t a Good Fit for Chelsea

In the span on 24 hours Chelsea have went from a club favored to progress to the knockout stages of the Champions League to a club with a new manager. Roberto Di Matteo is out and Rafa Benitez is the new manager of Chelsea. Here are four reasons why Rafa Benitez isn’t a good fit for Chelsea:

1) Chelsea fans don’t like him – At the end of the day (for most clubs) it’s the fans who pay the bills and Chelsea would not be where they are today without their fan support around the world. This is what Benitez had to say about Chelsea fans as the manager of Liverpool in 2007:

“We don’t need to give away stupid plastic flags to our fans to wave, our supporters are always there with their hearts and that is all we need. Its the passion of the fans that helps us to win matches, not flags. Chelsea fans lack passion.”

Chelsea fans will never let him forget that he said this and I hope a member of the media has the courage to ask him about this statement.

—

2) Chelsea legends don’t respect him-Liverpool and Chelsea had a lot of very difficult matches in the middle part of the 2000’s and Benitez sometimes only added fuel to the fire. He said the following about Chelsea legend Didier Drogba back in 2008:

“With Drogba it’s important to have a good referee. You can’t do anything (to stop him going down), but I will say it because it was so clear. He is amazing because he is massive (yet he goes down). It’s very impressive. I have a lot of clips of him from over the years and he surprises me. After four years I expected it. It’s very impressive.”

Drogba responsed…

“Benitez was a manager I respected a lot. Until now, I found him not only very competent but also classy. But he has really disappointed me here. His words demonstrate a weakness. A top manager would never go so low to attack a player. Maybe he should concentrate on his own team’s game and if he wants me to stay on my feet, maybe he should tell his defenders to stop hitting me. In the first leg, Carragher and the other one (Skrtel) didn’t stop. And not just with me. I finished the match with bruises everywhere. Last year, I broke a rib against Liverpool in the Champions League semi-final. Strangely, that escapes the statistics of Benitez.”

Way to get the legends on your side, Rafa.

—

3) His recent managerial record is simply not good – Honestly the first two points would mean nothing if Benitez could win games. Winning solves almost every problem in sports. However, Benitez is coming off of runs as a very poor manager at not one but two clubs.

  • In his last 21 games in charge of Liverpool the club won only 11 games (52% win percentage) and suffered 6 defeats.
  • In his 25 games in charge at Inter the club won only 12 games (48% win percentage) and suffered 7 defeats.
  • After Benitez was sacked by Inter, the club won 22 of their last 32 games (69% win percentage) and suffered only 7 defeats. Yes, When Rafa left Inter the club won 21% more of their games that season.

—

4) Lack of recent managerial experience – Benitez hasn’t managed a full game in almost two years, a 3-0 defeat for Inter at the hands of Werder Bremen. Managers have come out of long retirements and have been successful, but Benitez hasn’t even been around the game, working as a pundit / blogger in the Middle East. It’s going to take some time and patience for him to “shake the rust off” of his managerial skills and get back into the day-to-day life of being a manager – unfortunately time and patience are the last things Chelsea has.

 —

In short, the appointment of Benitez is a puzzling one to fans and media all around the world. After two “falling out” scenarios with major clubs in Europe his managerial appeal was very low for the remaining major clubs throughout the continent. Usually the “unwanted” are given that title for a reason and it’s baffling to see Chelsea remove a manager who had won the Champions League only 6 months ago for a manager with a checkered past (especially surrounding the club hiring him) who has been completely away from the game for two years.