O'neill took a side up 10 places, Rafa in the same time took his side to... exactly the same place. He got 2nd the next season which wasn't bad, but at the same time considering the club was finishing 4th before he joined it wasn't exactly a dramatic improvement. Rafa's purchases rarely paid off and when he lost a player he wanted to keep (Alonso), he couldn't adjust.Originally Posted by Psychotic
I was going to go through this point by point and make rebuttals including points tallies, win percentages and cup records and how liverpool had to actually play injured players in some games and whatnot, but I looked at what I typed, and realised I think I can do it a lot better like this:<img src="http://i43.photobucket.com/albums/e373/photobucketamazingness/1093.gif" height=150 width=125>Admittedly Martin spent only one million per season less than Rafa did however it should be noted that his spending actually paid off.
Aston Villa
2005-06: 16th - O'neill joins at start of next season.
2006-07: 11th
2007-08: 6th
2008-09: 6th
2009-10: 6th
Liverpool
2003-04: 4th - Benitez joins at start of next season.
2004-05: 5th
2005-06: 3rd
2006-07: 3rd
2007-08: 4th
2008-09: 2nd
2009-10: 7th
I think the key difference is that Rafa used to regularly take the piss out of and beat Man United and O'Neill didn't.
Rafa took the piss out of Manchester United? I wasn't even aware Rafa knew how to put a joke together at all. He certainly couldn't take them. He did beat Liverpool every now and then, sure, but Aston Villa did beat us as well.
The guys at work - none of which like United (and they don't like Celtic either, so have no bias towards Martin O'neill at all) - agree with me in my theory that Martin O'neill would have done better for Liverpool than Rafa did but they also agree that Rafa is still a better manager when managing European clubs. Just not English ones.
But it's okay, Liverpool supporters are allowed to think Rafa is amazing because it seems to make them feel better. I know that many other Manchester United fans as well as myself would have preferred that Rafa continue to be in charge for many seasons to come, but it seems that we have to put up with the rivals having a manager that has the potential to win the PL now.
