Agent Rafa.

Published: Monday, 29 November 2021

‘The plan remains the same. I get sacked by Christmas yea, big Dunc gets the job and gets H’everton relegated and I take over from Eddie Howe at Newcastle….’

If the above wasn’t so near the truth it would be funny. If you haven’t yet seen Darren Farley’s brilliant impersonation of Agent Rafa after H’everton’s defeat at Brentford - have a look. Here it is. 

Scary eh? It is funny in the round, but it’s a bit too near the truth for my liking.

Of course, no-one is really suggesting that Benitez is running H’everton into the ground on purpose, but this is the blog I knew I’d be writing sooner or later. And it certainly isn’t a self congratulatory ‘I told you so’.

Benitez should never have been given the H’everton job. Wrong man. Wrong club. It was always going to end in tears.

What I wrote when he was appointed didn’t go down well with everybody. I get that. Benitez has got a small army of ‘friends’ in the press (and the odd former player) who he’s managed to con for years and they quickly got to work to support the appointment - rubbishing me and others of the same view. I didn’t mind because I knew time would be his greatest enemy.

I also understood that Evertonians would swallow their guff and get behind Benitez, because whatever else, we all want to see our team do well.

The Rafa-lites also told me I knew nothing about what Evertonians really wanted. Wrong. During my four years in Liverpool I got it to know the club inside out. Many of my closest footballing friends are Evertonians. It’s a club closer to my heart than any other after Coventry. 

Evertonians bought into Rafa because they were drip fed the appointment over weeks - in order that their anger about it would subside -  and because they wanted someone to bring back the glory days. Moshiri promised a safe pair of hands - someone with pedigree. He delivered Benitez, whose hands were covered in Liverpool red. Let’s just say ‘red’.

It was a shameful appointment. Of course, the Rafa-lites were making plenty of noise as they swept to home wins over Southampton, Burnley and Norwich and for a while were almost replicating the start Ancelotti had delivered the previous season. But, inevitably, the wheels came off. It’s now two points from 21.

Benitez is starting to do what he does best - try to blame everybody else. It’s not his fault that he can’t sign players. It’s FFP. He blamed the restrictions for slipping Andros Townsend into Goodison. This guy couldn’t get into an average Crystal Palace team. There’s a reason Damarai Gray was in exile - and then there’s Salomon Rondon. I wonder why he follows Benitez everywhere? It’s certainly nothing to do with talent.

It’s not FFP. Alisher Usmanov has given up. He doesn’t want to spend anymore money. I wrote recently about a friend of mine in this part of the world that was offered H’everton for £500m. That was too much, but the sting in the tale was having to guarantee another £500m for the stadium. £1b? No chance. But trust me. H’everton is available for purchase.

So Benitez can have that one. There isn’t any money, but what I’m not having is his latest excuse to try and disguise the capitulation at Brentford. He reckons the fans should be more understanding of the ‘intensity’ and ‘mentaaality’ of the players, adding that there was a disconnect between fans and players last season, which he wasn’t responsible for. He claims he’s now working at repairing the relationship. No there wasn’t a disconnect . Most of last season passed without fans in the ground. Any ground. So how can he talk of a ‘disconnect’? How does he judge that?

If Everton lose the derby this week Moshiri should sack Benitez the very same evening - and apologise to Evertonians for his error. And it was his error. Bill Kenwright didn’t want Benitez - nor did anyone else at Goodison. Give it to big Dunc. And give Benitez what he really wants - an early conclusion to Agent Rafa’s master-plan.