Why wait until the end of the season?

[SK]

Overall though I think we should wait until the end of the season for two reasons:
1/ Rafa is in my opinion the man to turn things round and more importantly long term to build up the club from the bottom (i.e. youth levels) up. Other managers who people suggest don't seem ever to have built an infrastructure and sacking someone willing to do that for a short term fix will make things worse in seasons to come.

2/ I don't think we are as far off as some make out. A good month and the outlook would change. Combined with the fact we won't have big money to spend I think the prudent course is to stick with someone who knows teh squad and used most of them well last season.

Obviously there are factors that could change my mind - for instance if the majority of players seemed irreconcilable against him. In general I feel that people are too quick to judge this sort of thing and while I fully expect people to say that this has obviously already happened I think that Dunk-like interpretations of body language and the age old art of looking at people playing badly and saying they aren't trying aren't the ways to judge for me.

But is it the manager's job to build the clubs infrastructure as a whole, from top to bottom? Wouldn't it be better if lets say the people managing the club would have the general idea, of where they want the club to go, and how to get it there, instead of it being down to one man?

How about we get a sporting director(yes, yes i know it's not a very popular idea in england), so the club would have stability and a general sense of direction, regardelss of who the manager was, and that way a total rehaul wouldn't be needed every time the club changed managers. i know liverpool aren't a club that would change managers very often, but think about it for a second: in the shankly era, and after it, there was continuity, the next manager was picked from within the club, and a sense of direction was evident, if/when rafa leaves, we can either promote someone from within the club as manager, who would have the knowledge passed down to him by his predecessor, like barca did with pep, but it's a very risky thing to do, or perhaps have a different style of running the club, where a manager wouldn't have such an impact, regarding the clubs stability.

[carheex]

Rafa needs to go now. He's ****ing had it. He can take that useless lump of ****, Kuyt with him.

Can't motivate
Can't pick a team
Useless in the transfer market

We will NEVER win the league under him NEVER.

Guaranteed 4th place my arse, he can't even guarantee 6th.

Close the door behind you please........ I'm starting to think he's trying to engineer his sacking to get his 20m pay off.

Big money is needed to win the Premiership these days. Rafa did superbly to get us 2nd place last season, which is something that no other manager could probably have done for us. If we sack him now (which we cannot financially afford to do), what makes you think that all of a sudden a new manager is going to be given a huge transfer kitty?
We need to keep Rafa, and as much as I hate to say this, the only way we aren;t going to be disappointed from this point forward is stop thinking we actually have a chance of winning the league. If you're living on past glories and think that we have a right to be at the top then our season is over before a ball is even kicked.

[dww]

But is it the manager's job to build the clubs infrastructure as a whole, from top to bottom? Wouldn't it be better if lets say the people managing the club would have the general idea, of where they want the club to go, and how to get it there, instead of it being down to one man?

In this country I think the culture is that yes in general the manager is the best person to do it. The aim should be to put in a culture that can endure but I think that in general one persons vision is needed to drive that and the people managing the club should be in charge of selecting the man and allocating him the resources.

How about we get a sporting director(yes, yes i know it's not a very popular idea in england), so the club would have stability and a general sense of direction, regardelss of who the manager was, and that way a total rehaul wouldn't be needed every time the club changed managers. i know liverpool aren't a club that would change managers very often, but think about it for a second: in the shankly era, and after it, there was continuity, the next manager was picked from within the club, and a sense of direction was evident, if/when rafa leaves, we can either promote someone from within the club as manager, who would have the knowledge passed down to him by his predecessor, like barca did with pep, but it's a very risky thing to do, or perhaps have a different style of running the club, where a manager wouldn't have such an impact, regarding the clubs stability.

The problem is that the only successful director of football on any level has been Arneson at Chelsea and he hasn't developed any players himself yet merely bought young players with potential and as yet none of them have made a huge impact.

I agree that we should be aiming for that sort of continuity - I just see Rafa as the start of that. We need to get the right people in around him and for example the reserve team manager and Sammy Lee seem to be good calls which could well out live him at the club.

I'd rather the structure be put in place by a football man rather than the suits at the club. The only person who would be a middle ground would be Dalglish and he appears to be behind the way Rafa is changing things.

[redlancer]

Big money is needed to win the Premiership these days. Rafa did superbly to get us 2nd place last season, which is something that no other manager could probably have done for us. If we sack him now (which we cannot financially afford to do), what makes you think that all of a sudden a new manager is going to be given a huge transfer kitty?
We need to keep Rafa, and as much as I hate to say this, the only way we aren;t going to be disappointed from this point forward is stop thinking we actually have a chance of winning the league. If you're living on past glories and think that we have a right to be at the top then our season is over before a ball is even kicked.

Could be our biggest issue here.

There does seem to be a lack of confidence or something going on, the injuries haven't helped and on that point has anyone else noticed how all the teams seem to be going through a huge injury problem? Has the ball changed?

Mascher has probably been our MOM player but that probably highlights the issue that a defensive midfield player is getting MoM.

Wil be interesting to see how we play without him, it might be blessing in disguise as either Masher or Lucas should be on the bench for us to be more attack minded. Which would then allow the defence to push more up the pitch and might also provide the outlet for the defence instead of hoofing it up
Also remember comments re the players prefering or wanting Masher to be sold anyday over Alonso, alot jump on the bandwagon of Rafa's lost the players could it be that some players arn't getting on with each other, re the sending off yesterday it was noticed Stevie the captain didn't talk to the ref.

Rafa isn't the only one who should be motivating the players, the captain, Sammy Lee, Kenny, are all at the club.

It could easily be the players thought this was their year and have had a huge crises of confidence with a couple of bad results.

Not saying Rafa aint to blame or shouldn't go, but there's 11 players on the pitch and a backroom to look at aswell.

[SK]

In this country I think the culture is that yes in general the manager is the best person to do it. The aim should be to put in a culture that can endure but I think that in general one persons vision is needed to drive that and the people managing the club should be in charge of selecting the man and allocating him the resources.

The problem is that the only successful director of football on any level has been Arneson at Chelsea and he hasn't developed any players himself yet merely bought young players with potential and as yet none of them have made a huge impact.

I agree that we should be aiming for that sort of continuity - I just see Rafa as the start of that. We need to get the right people in around him and for example the reserve team manager and Sammy Lee seem to be good calls which could well out live him at the club.

I'd rather the structure be put in place by a football man rather than the suits at the club. The only person who would be a middle ground would be Dalglish and he appears to be behind the way Rafa is changing things.

well i'm not suggesting a suit would be ideal, as normally former players who have a knack for the biusness side of things make very good sporting directors

sammy lee sounds like a good shout for the next manager, or even just a caretaker, but he didn't exactly have the best of times at bolton, and imo is better suited for the assistant man role.

the main point i see, or better yet don't see, is where are we heading as a club under rafa? what is our philosophy now? it's not "pretty" football, it's not giving young local kids a go? what is it? in the 5 1/2 years rafa has been here there hasn't been anything to suggest a long term plan.

[dww]

well i'm not suggesting a suit would be ideal, as normally former players who have a knack for the biusness side of things make very good sporting directors

sammy lee sounds like a good shout for the next manager, or even just a caretaker, but he didn't exactly have the best of times at bolton, and imo is better suited for the assistant man role.

the main point i see, or better yet don't see, is where are we heading as a club under rafa? what is our philosophy now? it's not "pretty" football, it's not giving young local kids a go? what is it? in the 5 1/2 years rafa has been here there hasn't been anything to suggest a long term plan.

We shouldn't give local players a chance unless they earn it. We haven't had a good enough development program for years. Rafa until this season had limited control and the disconnects have made things worse.

There have been huge things that suggest a long term plan. Until this season the way the team developed was clear and we had a definite style. We built from a strong defensive base to control possession and when we did that we produced effective attacking football that often also looked pretty good.

We have had a set back but that doesn't mean some of those principles aren't there and there has been a decent number of younger players given a chance even if injuries have given them the chance (and in Darby and Kelly's cases taken some away as well).

[dww]

Oh and on the Sammy Lee front I think a number of things are worth saying: firstly I'm not sure of him as a manager either but then the Bolton job was short and he undertook a huge job in changing the way that team played and was given limited time to succeed. In this country we seem to count managers as failures after a single bad job and I'm not sure that is the right way to go - often people learn from mistakes. Also everyone was trotting out the cliche about assistants with reference to Hughton earlier in the season but he is making a real go of it at Newcastle.

[SK]

We shouldn't give local players a chance unless they earn it. We haven't had a good enough development program for years. Rafa until this season had limited control and the disconnects have made things worse.

There have been huge things that suggest a long term plan. Until this season the way the team developed was clear and we had a definite style. We built from a strong defensive base to control possession and when we did that we produced effective attacking football that often also looked pretty good.

We have had a set back but that doesn't mean some of those principles aren't there and there has been a decent number of younger players given a chance even if injuries have given them the chance (and in Darby and Kelly's cases taken some away as well).

ok yeah, he hasn't had the control he should have had, till recently, but i think that every manager that comes to a new club, especially one so in need of an overhaul, starts by sorting out the defence, and building things on from there, but as far as i can see rafa hasn't built on from there, or even hasn't been willing to build on from there. one could argue that the financial restraints had a part in that, but there are teams with less money than us, who spend it on players who can play. and it's not just all about money, it's finding the right players. how come wigan have had so much success recently with "flair" players from south america, but most of rafa's buys from there seem like utter turd. bad scouting maybe?

i agree local players should not be treated differently to others but they are, if not for anything else it's for uefa's quotas to be met. would spearing be even close to the first team if he was from, say paraguay?

anyhow my initial point from which i strayed from, was that liverpool as a club need to think where they're heading, what they want, and how to achieve that, and not only regarding on-pitch matters but the club as a whole, and the second question should be, is rafa the right man to be trusted such an important task.

Oh and on the Sammy Lee front I think a number of things are worth saying: firstly I'm not sure of him as a manager either but then the Bolton job was short and he undertook a huge job in changing the way that team played and was given limited time to succeed. In this country we seem to count managers as failures after a single bad job and I'm not sure that is the right way to go - often people learn from mistakes. Also everyone was trotting out the cliche about assistants with reference to Hughton earlier in the season but he is making a real go of it at Newcastle.

i like sammy, and i agree that trying to make bolton play, is like finding a likeable scum fan, but i think that he's too nice a guy to be a manager, but is a great assistant manager

[Shaggy]

Rumours of a press conference tomorrow at 11am emanating from RAOTL.

[Lee]

Rumours of a press conference tomorrow at 11am emanating from RAOTL.

What's RAOTL mate?

[Shaggy]

Red All Over The Land aka The Rattle....LFC fanzine/forum.

[Lee]

Red All Over The Land aka Rattle....LFC fanzine/forum.

Never heard of that one, how reliable are the posters usually??

[Reece]

The thread I can see looks a bit like a load of bollocks though.

[Shaggy]

The thread I can see looks a bit like a load of bollocks though.

You a member? I can't view it. Probably just another one of those famous Liverpudlian rumours.

[Reece]

You a member? I can't view it. Probably just another one of those famous Liverpudlian rumours.

No, but a bit of sneaky googling gets me to here which is where I assume the thread in question is

http://forum.raotl.co.uk/viewforum.php?f=1