Torres farce at Fulham shows Benitez is the Jedward of football. But does he still have the X Factor for Liverpool?

By David Maddock

Published 14:42 03/11/09

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As those sweet-voiced angels John and Edward have discovered, with the spotlight, comes intense, appalling, ridiculous, unwarranted criticism.

Rafael Benitez is the Jedward of the football world at the moment, vilified for merely trying to do his best under extreme, trying circumstances. The wonderfully talented Irish twins must sympathise with his predicament, not least because they are followers of the game themselves, and indeed sport discreet tattoos of their chosen team, Crewe Alexandra.

Benitez as manager of Liverpool, knows more than anyone that, with his position, comes pressure, and illogical abuse. But surely, it was going too far - much too far - to suggest at the weekend that he must be sacked for playing Fernando Torres for only an hour of the game at Fulham.

It transpires that Torres has a hernia, which can be managed carefully to allow him to play on without an operation, but the key phrase here is ’carefully’, because asking too much of him will risk an injury that could take months to recover from.

Now Benitez obviously knows this, and has calculated when he can use a player who is crucial to his plans. And he also knows when he must take the player away from danger, such as at Craven Cottage on  Saturday.

It is a difficult balancing act, because when you are surrounded by the pressure Benitez now finds himself engulfed by, then you clearly want to use a player of such talent as often as possible.

But as he says,  short term gain is long term pain, and he can not afford to lose the man his tactics are basically built around. Which brings us to the game in Lyon that will define Liverpool’s season.

Benitez has been accused of putting Europe before the Premier League, because it will help him get a job with another club on the continent. Quite absurd. In fact, utter, utter nonsense.

Of course he wants to win the Premier League. It would place him in the same bracket as the truly great Liverpool managers Bob Paisley, Bill Shankly and Kenny Dalglish. What better incentive than that?

But he knows two other things. One, Liverpool have lost five games in the league already this season, which will make it pretty hard to become Champions, even were they to have an immaculate campaign from now on.

Two, going out of Europe at this early stage would have dire financial consequences for the Anfield club, not only in terms of lost prize money and potential sponsorship, but also because of the impact it would have on the rest of the season.

Lose in Lyon, and Liverpool are out of the Champions’ League. But worse, Benitez comes under the sort of intense pressure that leaves a club beleaguered, almost paralysed. It is something they can ill afford, given the negativity surrounding the club because of the issues with the owners.

If that is not bad enough, then the Spanish coach also has injury problems that would decimate a small army, never mind a football squad. he has so few options here in Lyon that I’ve brought my boots just in case.

So what is he to do? The only answer is to manage the best he can, just like those brave souls John and Edward do every Saturday night with the talent they have at their disposal.

In Benitez’s case, he manages by playing Torres for as long as possible, and trying to inspire his troops by circling the wagons, as he did spectacularly against Manchester United recently. That shows what he can do given the resources, but clearly those resources are stretched to breaking point.

Don’t write him off though. He was in a worse situation two years ago when Jurgen Klinsmann was about to be given his job, and when he was within one game of the sack at Valencia before going on to win the Spanish title that very season.

Just like our heroes Jedward, he could still have the X Factor.

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