Since Rafa Benitez has returned to the EPL he has shown the same sort of form he showed at Liverpool. After much success in his first few years at Liverpool failings began to show. Ever the tinkerer he would switch players from the team with predictable regularity, changing the way the team played and removing much of the consistency. Impressive wins were followed by shocking defeats.
Substitutions were another sore point. When chasing victories he would fail to strengthen the attack, either by bringing players on too late to affect the game, or making senseless changes such as replacing a defender with another defender instead of bolstering the attack.
His form at Chelsea indicates he has learned little since his time away and Chelsea are poised to make the same mistakes as Liverpool under Benitez’ reign. He is supposed to remain until the end of the season and has done just enough so far to avoid the sack so far (he showed this flair at Liverpool as well). He may also be helped by the poisoned chalice of Abramovich – managers have been fired so regularly at Chelsea since the chairman took over that they are running out of top managers that would want to handle the expectations. Either way it seems unlikely Benitez will hold on to the post next season.
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