Making sense of Rafa’s dilemma

IN the often senseless and always ruthless world of football it came as no great surprise.

Even so the heart sank when the words ‘sack’ and ‘Rafael Benitez’ were trotted out in the same sentence just 152 days after Steven Gerrard held aloft the Champions League trophy in Istanbul following one of the most spectacular comebacks in living memory.

The sentiment was aired on one of those post-match phone-ins following Liverpool’s Carling Cup defeat against Crystal Palace and should be dismissed as little more than the braying of a feeble mind.

Thankfully, it does not yet appear to be representative of the general mood, despite Liverpool trailing Premiership leaders Chelsea by 18 points after just eight matches.

They are a sharp and fair-minded lot as a rule on Merseyside.

They recognise that Benitez in his first season at Liverpool reconnected a great club with its triumphant past.

They flaunt their European champions flags at every opportunity and there is hope, if no great expectation, that football’s most prestigious club prize can be successfully defended this term.

But neither are they blind.

And it is becoming increasingly obvious that Benitez is struggling with the cut and high-tempo thrust of English football.

Where in Europe Benitez appears confident of his best team and his most effective tactics, at home he has become the Premiership’s great tinkerer, forever switching his team selections and only adding to the uncertainty which pervades Anfield.

The Carling Cup defeat at a Crystal Palace still adjusting to the Championship was just the latest example of Benitez’s inability to counter the power of the English game.

It was his reaction to Liverpool’s defeat at Fulham on Saturday, however, which was most worrying.

“We all know we have to change the attitude,” said Benitez. “The performance was bad in terms of the aggressiveness of the players.”

That is a serious indictment of his Liverpool team.

Fans can excuse the odd technical deficiency. They can live with defeat if they are convinced the players have given every drop of sweat, energy and enthusiasm to the cause. But fans cannot tolerate performances lacking in heart and aggression.

Inevitably, that reflects on the fibre of Benitez’s signings and their willingness to scrap in the bread and butter of the league and domestic cups as they do on the more glamorous and less physically taxing European stage.

How can a team which has dispatched Chelsea, Real Betis, AC Milan, Juventus, Bayer Leverkusen, Olympiacos and Monaco in Europe stumble so wretchedly against Crystal Palace?

It is a question Benitez should be directing to the fragile Luis Garcia, with three goals in 18 games and the disappointing Fernando Morientes with no goals since April.

One, too, he might put to Boudewijn Zenden, Josemi and Mohammed Sissoko, who all arrived as part of Benitez’s e64 million rebuilding programme but who have failed to gel in the in-out existence which is life in the Anfield first team.

Then there is Harry Kewell, an excuse for an Australian and whose lethargy explodes the myth that all Aussies are passionate about sport.

Benitez did not bring the lackadaisical Kewell to Anfield but the manager has not bought well.

He also failed to land the winger, the central defender and the striker he wanted during the summer transfer window, although the club could hardly be blamed for refusing to fork out e23m for Michael Owen 12 months after they had sold him to Real Madrid for half that amount.

However, it is the lack of domestic goals, just five in the Premiership so far, which is costing Liverpool most.

And that brings us to Peter Crouch, 11 games, no goals, and who has become the easiest of targets for opposition baiters and phone-in taunters.

Critics of 6’ 7’’ Crouch fall into two categories.

He’s either a target man with a sweet touch who holds up the ball well but does not score enough goals.

Or he is the least subtle and most reviled front man to hit Merseyside since Bernard Manning last played the Empire.

Benitez and Sven-Goran Eriksson insist on the former, the cruel jeers which follow Crouch around England suggest an increasing number of opposition fans believe the latter.

It’s tough on Crouch, whose confidence must be crumbling. It is becoming the issue at the root of Benitez’s dilemma in bringing Liverpool’s European form to the domestic table.

Benitez and Crouch, however, have one thing in common. They deserve time and understanding.

And not the knee-jerk abuse of the mindless minority.