Thoughts At Kop

When Rafa Benitez left the job, there was a mixed response from the fans.Part of the fans were happy to see the back of the Spaniard while some were grateful for what he had done in his five years tenure at Anfield. The vacancy of the job was then being linked to several managers, from Alex McLeish to Martin O' Neill.However, it was then decided by the Board that Roy Hodgson is the man to bring the club forward after the mess left behind by Rafa Benitez.

7th place in the league with no champion league games next season , star players like Fernando Torres, Steven Gerrard, Javier Mascherano were being linked with other European giants as they were all expected to head the exit of Anfield and leave this troubled club behind.One must have think that Roy is the man to bring joy when he convinced the likes of Gerrard and Torres to stay at the club besides bringing in Joe Cole on free transfer but the thought seems to be a premature one. Roy clearly doesn't bring much joy as Liverpool Football Club have their worst start of the season in 18 years.

As Blackpool continued their fairytale start of life in Premier League, Liverpool FC continued to slump into yet another Premier League defear.6 points from 7 games. That's what Roy had done so far.Now, Liverpool were left languishing in the relegation zone.Unbelievable.The once mighty Reds had now gone on 5 games without a win.

When the club appointed Roy Hodgson as the man to replace Rafa Benitez, there were question marks everywhere as he clearly wasn't an upgrade from the Spaniard.Despite winning the Manager of The Year award last May, Roy is never one known for his tactics. He is not an upgrade of Rafa but one who would do well in steadying the sinking ship left behind by the Spaniard.In some way ,however, the two of them seems to be pretty similar.The only difference is that Rafa did all that in 5 years and it only took 3 months for Roy to do it.

1.Excuses

While Rafa is well known for finding excuses for himself, Roy seems to be following the path of his predecessor.Early in the season, he already started finding excuse for himself by telling the whole wide world, the club will not be able to win the league unless a new owner bought the club off the dirty hands of the yanks.Being realistic he was but how would that have done with the team morale, it definitely affects the team badly.Was he trying to lower the fans expectation to save his job?No one knows but one can confirm that he is a better in finding excuse than Rafa. After the game against Sunderland, Roy asked the fans to lower their expectation.Was it too much to ask for from the players to get full 3 points from Sunderland?What a disgrace to a club who had won 5 times the Champion League.

Rafa 0
Roy 1

2.Bad relationship with players (Man Management)
Rafa is never known for his man management.Even then, he had some problem with his right hand man, Pako which ultimately lead to Pako resigning and leaving the club.Subsequently, he brought in Sammy Lee to help him in that particular area.Throughout his tenure, Rafa had a lot of problems with player.He had one with Alonso, with Keane, with Riera and with Benayoun.Of all these, Alonso, despite being unhappy with Rafa's treatment, remained silenced and did not blast off the man who brought him over from Real Sociedad.Keane,Riera and Benayoun all had their fair share of opinions on Rafa's bad man management.The fact is Rafa is never a manager known for a pat on the back of players - the type that Gerrard fancy. He is cold and would prefer to keep a distance from the players.He doesn't want to get too close with the players. That's a FAHCT.

Roy, on the other hand, seems to be a better manager in man management area.When he left, most of his players were praising and applauding him off.One would never expect him to follow the footpath of the Rafa so closely and yet so effectively.

One month into his job, there was already player being unhappy with Roy's way of handling the team. Chris Mavinga, one of the reserve team regular, blasted Roy for being English favourism.He wanted to leave but Roy blocked the deal.Few weeks later, we then had Mascherano, already left for Barcelona, blasting Roy for accusing him of something he had not done.Disappointed he was but he couldn't care less as he is now more happy in Spain.Then, we have Agger, coming out , blasting the boss for his long ball tactic.No one know what happened then but Agger is still warming the bench and now, to make things worse, he is gone from the bench list...Had an injury...or so they said...

Rafa 1
Roy 1

3.Stubbornness
Rafa is stubborn.Everybody knows that. The fans know it, the board know it even the chef in the canteen know it.The same goes to Roy.So far, his tactic has gone from bad to worse.Yet, he still sticks to it and make little changes.One would expect him to make more changes when needed but he did not.For instance, the Lucas-Poulsen partnership was never gonna be working.Both were too defensive-minded and yet, Roy has the audacity to stick with it for few games.The fans were then scratching their head, asking why the gaffer bought Meireles in in the first place.Pointless. In a must-win match, the fans were expecting the gaffer to start and play with attacking mentality.Two defensive midfielders wont do any good to a side that clearly need goals more than defensive power.

When Rafa kept sticking with Kuyt despite him being on goal drought in the league matches, the fans were unhappyand questioned his decision but Kuyt repaid his faith by scoring a lot of goals in the European matches.But what did Poulsen provide to the team?I see careless passes, losing possession when he should be keeping it for the team.Never score or assist any goals do not matter as he is a defensive midfielder.However, most of his mistakes were vital and caused the team to concede goals.I have no idea why Roy is sticking with him despite us having quite some alternatives in the likes of Meireles, Gerrard, Lucas, Shelvey,Spearing...

Rafa 0
Roy 1

Well, Roy beats Rafa in almost every section of the faults.In some way, Roy did it more efficiently and effectively then the Spaniard.Differences between them were Rafa loves the club and care about the supporters while Roy doesn't seem to be so.Also worth noticing is that Rafa has the guts to defend his players even if it means an offence to other managers or losing out friends.Roy couldn't care less.When Fergus accused of Torres being a cheat, he said Fergus was in a better position than he was to see the incident.Maybe he doesn't want to risk losing the wine drinking session with Ferguson but that clearly doesn't do good to the team as they have a boss who do not defend them in public...Oh wait...He did come out defend Torres...after one/two weeks....

When Roy was appointed, I did not expect him to bring us joy or glory but neither did I expect him to do so badly that caused a heartbreaking and bring disappointment after disappointment to every fans out there.Five games without a win. What's next? Roy oh Roy...