The whole gross v net spending argument is pointless as the fact is he has spent £220m mostly on players who have not developed. The footballl we have played under Rafa has been as just as inept as under Houllier .
I just feel the whole "We don't have the funds" attitude of Rafa and many others failed to address the fact that from top to bottom there was/ is a lack of leadership and judgement. But ultimately I feel that the coaching/ management is flawed.
Especially when you look at player development.
When I analyse this I find the following:
1) Everton coached Rooney to become a 30mil player.
2) Berbatov cost Spurs around 11mil. Spurs then coached Berbatov to become a 30 mil player. The inital figure Spurs paid for him is approx the same as what we spent on Kuyt. We also spent roughly the same on Babel.
We rejected a bid of 9mil for Babel (which including what we have spent in wages on him adds up to be a huge loss) and how many clubs would pay 30mil for Kuyt?
We have had season after season of Rafa telling us we have less money so have to develop our own players to compete, but how many of them have actually developed under his coaching system?
To highlight this you only have to look at players both past and present.
Alonso - Great first season, major dip in form and we fail to get the best out of him until he feels the need to be in the shop window for his dream move to Real (after Rafa trying to sell him to buy Barry)
Bellamy - Signed on the back of a good season only to fade away and sign for City.
Kuyt - Prolific goal scorer for Feyenoord, in his first few games showed great touch, vision and movement only to see a major dip in form and then be switched to the wing.
Keane - Never had been a prolific goal scorer until 06/07 & 07/08. Has always been a gifted player though especially when playing just behind the front man. Signed on the back of his two most prolific seasons. Used as a lone striker. Sold at a loss half way through the season after being baffled with tactics.
Now this is the one that really gets to me.
Yossi Benayoun - whether other Liverpool fans would agree with me or not this guy is actually one of our most technically gifted and minded players. Right footed and shows an eye for goal. Often has to make do with a place on the bench, even after scoring the week before and when brought on usually has to play on the left wing when it is obvious he should be playing just off Torres.
Alonso is the only one of the above who we turned from a 10mil player into a 30mil player and it was Rafa poor management that instigated that.
Which brings another issue, when all the world could see we needed to reinvest that money into buying a striker why did we buy an injured midfielder? And why given Rafa's constant "We have no money" bleat did he decide to spend 17mil on a right back who can not defend? At least Johnson can attack though.
For me it shows other than Torres (who I think most people knew was an extremely good striker) he really hasn't a much of a clue when it comes to buying attacking players and when he does make a decent signing he doesn't know how to use them.
We really need a manager who can sort out the whole coaching system.
Players play in their natural positions.
Get training to consist of actually playing football and getting to know the movement of your team mates.
Use man marking when defending set pieces.
And actually use a bit of man management, praise players for showing skill, flair and imagination.
Play and develop the youth players and don't drop them the week after they have played a good game. (Infact don't drop players at all after they have had a good game, unless they are unfit of course)
Unlike some I don't think bringing the King back into the post would be wise but something has always stuck in my mind from what he says in a book I have. When posed the question of what we did in training that made us so good he answered "We play football."
