Tell you what, you point me in the direction of another manager who could have gotten us to two European Cup finals with forwards like Baros, Bellamy and Crouch.
Surrounded by yes men? Like who? Go on.
£120m in wages? Probably, yes, so what? That's the going rate for shite these days, it's unavoidable. The last estimate on wages for Liverpool was £107m, which is dwarfed still by United (£123m) and Chelsea (£167m), and doesn't include Man City and Spurs because the figures were taken from 2007/08, but only released in June of this year by Deloitte.
Spent badly? Start naming them.
For me, he energised the careers of Torres, Reina, Mascherano, Riera, Kuyt, Maxi, Alonso, Sissoko, Lucas, Benayoun, Crouch, Bellamy. Players who were short of takers at the highest level (Torres aside), Rafa saw the potential where others did not.
Two players seem to be the crux of people's opinion of Rafa, those being Johnson and Aquilani. The first is still a brilliant right back, no matter what Hodgson says, he's proved time, and time, and time again at both club level and international level that he's in the same bracket as Maicon when he's on form. And the other lad just bossed the Rome derby yesterday, unwanted by Hodgson.
We can get in Mourinho, Ferguson, anyone you like. They won't replicate what Benitez achieved in those 6 years, not without being able to bring in three £20m players a season.
No, it's not working out at Inter. I wonder just how well it will ever work again at Inter. Teams, like players, cannot just hang around at the top, they need to work even harder to stay there, and Inter just dont seem to have their heart in it. Players can age very quickly when they get into their 30's, just ask Carragher.
We didn't deserve to keep Rafa.