Barca humiliation puts Rafa on brink
NOT since his half-season spell at Chelsea will Rafa Benitez have felt more like an interim manager. After this historic 4-0 reverse at home to Barcelona on Saturday, the 55-year-old looks to be on borrowed time at the Bernabeu.
The club were briefing yesterday that his position is safe for now but after such a humbling there seems little chance he will stay beyond the summer. And with Cristiano Ronaldo openly courted by Louis van Gaal, he may not be the only one to walk away in 2016.
The suggestion that Ronaldo told Real Madrid president Florentino Perez after the game: ‘Either the coach goes at the end of the season or I do’, is unfounded. But Ronaldo did little to hide his disapproval when Benitez replaced Carlo Ancelotti at the start of the season and their relationship is one of several reasons why his departure looks likely.
With van Gaal welcoming the idea of an emotional homecoming at Old Trafford for Ronaldo and French media claiming Paris Saint-Germain chairman Nasser Al-Khelaifi met with the forward’s agent Jorge Mendes last week, there are at least two clubs with both the desire and the money to sign him in the summer.
For all the public noise about demanding that any club must meet his €1,000m buy-out clause, Madrid would be unlikely to resist any offer that came close to the £80million he cost them in 2009.
Ronaldo did receive a smattering of the jeers and whistles as 80,000 Real Madrid supporters saw their team taken apart by a Barcelona side without Lionel Messi in the starting line-up.
‘Benitez go now’ could also be heard during the game, although supporters reserved most of their ire for Perez — in part because he hired Benitez in the summer.
The manager responded to criticism about his defensive style by picking an ultra-attacking line-up but, as he later admitted, the plan rested on the players pressing high and they failed to do so effectively.
It had been 16 years since a Benitez team had lost by four goals. He was the coach of Spanish minnows Extremadura when it last happened. On Saturday he gave the president and the fans the attacking line-up they wanted but not the performance.
Fabio Capello, working for TV during the game, said he was surprised to see Benitez leave out his trusted holding midfielder Casemiro. He urged the club to give Benitez more time. Capello was told he would not be carrying on midway through the 2006-07 season by then Madrid president Ramon Calderon. He won La Liga but still left at the end of that campaign.
The players could now decide the immediate fate of Benitez. There will be a long, uncomfortable journey to Ukraine to play Shakhtar Donetsk on Wednesday and then a difficult trip to Eibar this Sunday.
‘We weren’t a team. We gave them too much space. It is difficult to say why this happened but it is not the first time,’ said Madrid midfielder Luka Modric after Barcelona moved six points clear at the top of the table.