MAN CITY 10 YEARS ON I really feel sorry Rafa’s open to visit from boss Ashley
RAFA BENITEZ will not bow to owner Mike Ashley’s request for a formal invitation to the Newcastle training ground.
Ashley has let Benitez know, via managing director Lee Charnley, he would welcome an approach to watch the Toon players at the club’s Benton training base.
And he would also appreciate Benitez personally asking him to attend a match at St James’ Park – something he has not done since the Magpies clinched the Championship title last May.
Ashley and Benitez have met on only a handful of occasions, the last three months ago. But the Toon manager has day-to-day contact with Charnley, who has told Benitez that his relationship with Ashley may benefit if the owner was invited.
But Benitez feels it is not his job to hold out an olive branch to the controversial owner, who has repeatedly frustrated him with his hands-off approach and reluctance to back him in the transfer market. And Benitez believes that if Ashley wants to watch the squad being put through their paces or turn up on match day, he does not need permission.
“He is always welcome here, so no problems,” said Benitez. “We are a professional club and we are open to anyone. And as the owner, he can come whenever he wants.”
With the clock ticking on Benitez’s contract, which runs out next June, there is the distinct possibility Newcastle’s two major figures may have no direct contact between now and then. Benitez has already revealed there are no imminent plans for talks on a new deal after he felt bitterly let down by the hierarchy during the summer transfer window. Ashley will not be at the Etihad Stadium today when Benitez will adopt the same defensive tactics that drew criticism last week as Newcastle had just 19 per cent possession in their 2-1 home loss to Chelsea.
The Magpies boss believes the fact the club spent so little in the summer means they should be grouped with relegation favourites Huddersfield and Cardiff. “You have to have ambition but you have to be realistic,” he said. “The best way for us to get results and to stay in the Premier League is to be realistic.” BENITEZ: Realistic VINCENT KOMPANY says Manchester City must continue to take advantage of the traumas experienced across town at the club whose shadow they lived in for so many years.
City celebrate a decade of ownership by Abu Dhabi billionaire Sheikh Mansour today with Kompany surprisingly expressing some sympathy for Manchester United’s struggle to recapture the glory years they enjoyed under Sir Alex Ferguson.
But the City captain, who was signed two weeks before the takeover that transformed English football, says Pep Guardiola’s reigning champions will be relentless in their bid to protect their local and national pre-eminence.
Asked how much the balance of power in Manchester has shifted, Kompany delivers a diplomatic response.
“It’s a question that I always find uncomfortable to answer,” he said. “What I like to say is that I’ll give the neighbours a little bit, I’ll have compassion for them, because Sir Alex Ferguson was such a big personality.
“You cannot take somebody like that out of a club and think everything is going to continue like before. You always need a transition period.
“Manchester United is still a big club, it’s still a club that competes for the Premier League and everything else, but it’s also still a club that’s dealing with a post-Ferguson era. So they’ll always get that side of me, feeling compassionate.
“But any time it takes them to get back up, we need to take advantage of it.”
They are certainly doing that. City have finished above United in the Premier League in six of the past seven seasons, and in each of the five campaigns since Ferguson retired, including last season’s record-breaking title success, which was their third championship in seven years. Backed by the Sheikh’s REPORTS petrodollars, they have spent well over £1billion on players over the past decade but Kompany hits back at the critics of the spend, spend, spend policy, arguing it is only a case of them playing catch-up over a short space of time to match what rivals United, Chelsea and Liverpool invested over a longer period.
“If you talk about City, what is fair?” said the Belgium defender. “The status quo? Should City be in the third division and say we’ve got awesome fans with 30,000 in the stadium but we’re never really allowed to have success? What is fair then? I’ve never seen anybody being paid peanuts and going to play for one of the big clubs – it’s obviously because they have more resources. “Any kind of investment that’s been made by City over the years is to overtake 20 years of an advantage by any other club.” City are now unrecognisable from the club Kompany, then 22, joined from Hamburg for £6m in August 2008. There were not even doors on the toilets at their old training ground. Now they have every luxury imaginable at their £2bn state-of-the-art Etihad training campus.
Of the many players City have signed over the past decade, Kompany remembers two for different reasons: Brazilian striker Robinho, a £32m ‘statement signing’ by the Sheikh on the day the takeover was announced; and Mario Balotelli for the attention – often unwanted – he brought on the club.
“Robinho would make us look silly because he was doing keep-uppy with rolled up socks,” said Kompany. “We were like, ‘OK, when can we head it?!’ You’re looking at him and thinking, ‘OK he’s extraterrestrial!’
But