by ivor_the_injun » Sun May 30, 2004 2:46 am
I'd personally be happy if either O'Neill or Benitez got the job.
Everyone's suddenly tarring MON with the "long ball" brush, but bear in mind that he's inherited squads that haven't had masses of quality in the middle of the park but tons of physical presence up front - Heskey at Leicester; Hartson and (to a lesser extent) Sutton at Celtic. Aside from when they play Rangers, punting it up to Hartson and getting him to lay it off to Larsson is all that Celtic have need to do to win matches in the SPL, so he's had no reason to change his winning formula.
Don't forget though that his side did a job on us a couple of seasons ago, and it wasn't because they had a better squad. If he had Gerrard, Owen, Kewell and Cisse at his disposal, he's obviously play to their strengths - you send your team out with a system that'll win you matches. Basically, the man is crying out to be given a big job with a good squad and money in the bank, and I wouldn't begrudge him the job for one second. He's a lot more tactically astute than people are giving him credit for - anyone that's heard him talking about the game can tell you that he's no Joe Kinnear.
As for Benitez, I like many only know him by reputation. What has struck me is that he sends his teams out to kill the opposition with pace, passing and movement, and that'll do me very nicely thank you very much. I'd love LFC to win the league next season even if they play ugly, but coming second or third and lighting up stadiums with top quality attacking football would do me in a season where we need to find some upward direction.