

Rafa Benetiz: A title winning soccer manager who codes - dko
http://soccernet.espn.go.com/columns/story/_/id/1041950/richard-jolly:-the-forward-thinking-rafa-benitez?cc=5901

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atticusfinch
Things have been changing really fast in the last couple of years in the
football world and nowadays most clubs use all kinds of tools at their
disposal. Some examples I can think of: GPS technology to track the training
sessions, relying on OPTA to provide detailed statistics about
matches/opponents/players and even using the database of a game such as
Football Manager for their scouting network. Rafa Benitez is an example of a
coach who takes it one step further but there a loads of other coaches who
rely heavily upon statistics. It's an industry where there are still a lot of
opportunities for entrepreneurs.

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philwelch
Prozone (<http://www.prozonesports.com/index.html>) is a big factor as well.
(And as much as I love Football Manager, I'm dubious of its value as a
scouting tool. It seems more a compilation of conventional wisdom, and is just
plain wrong often enough that it's hard to manage any team you follow or know
well in real life.)

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atticusfinch
Prozone! When I was typing the comment I was also thinking about them but
couldn't remember the name. They're also a major player.

Football Manager relies on a network of 1000 scouts in 50 countries monitoring
20,000 teams. It's a useful first step in the search for the next star.
Everton are the first club who signed a deal to get access to the full
database.

~~~
philwelch
I'm sure they do, but the flaws in the database are very noticeable to the
observant fan. I haven't gotten around to buying FM12 yet, but in FM11 they
got a lot of big things wrong: Philipp Lahm is rated as a natural right-back
even though he's a natural left-back, Gareth Bale's pace is underrated, Lionel
Messi is rated almost as a pure right winger even though he plays effectively
in a more central role, Sergio Busquets is underrated (Sergio Busquets is
always underrated though), and a lot of wingers are very underrated playing in
inverted positions compared to their real-life counterparts.

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toyg
He's actually a poster-boy for the limits of tech: despite all his whiz-bang
technowizardry, he's a crap, overrated manager.

What little he won, he bought it with millions and an incredible stroke of
luck in one Istanbul night. His Liverpool was terrible but had a few
charismatic players at the absolute top of their game. No wonder Benitez
lasted only a few months in his next high-flying job (although to be honest,
it would have been a poison chalice for almost any manager).

I predict he will keep doing badly as long as he insists in being a coach. His
skills in tech do not compensate for his evident lack of footballing
knowledge.

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nikcub
10 trophies, including the champions league, in his last 9 years of
management. I wish I could be that crap

He bought a new level of professionalism and analytics to management (before
Mourinho), as well as his own tactical style that changed a lot of the game.

I have heard him be called a lot of things, but 'crap' definitely isn't one
that fits.

Edit: see 'Rafa, footballs forgotten man': <http://www.footandball.net/rafael-
benitez-forgotten-man/>

~~~
toyg
Two of those trophies were single-match competitions (2010) which are little
more than friendlies: one is played at the very beginning of the season, and
the other after a brutal flight to Japan (and with no pressure whatsoever:
nobody cares for that particular trophy, it's just a commercial opportunity
for Asian markets).

At Liverpool, considering the money spent, he underachieved every year except
the very first season (which, as I said, was really blind luck, and again it
was a team he did not even build). He benefited from a situation where he
basically had to compete with only three other clubs in the EPL, and still
never managed to win a league; except for La Liga (which is really a minor
league when compared to the EPL or the Italian Serie A), his victories always
came from cups, where luck has a much larger role than his vaunted statistical
and managerial skills. His football was terrible to watch. The more he asked
for total control, and the more he would get it, the worst it got; a pattern
he started in Valencia and also repeated at Inter. His successors were even
worse but they also got much less money to spend, thanks to all the money he
did _not_ leave in the coffers.

His only real achievements were with Valencia, a project he did not start.

I wouldn't hire Rafa Benitez to manage a fourth-rated club, let alone a top-
flight property, and I must not be the only one to think that if he's still
unemployed after more than a year.

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nikcub
do you have any idea where Liverpool ranked in both net spend and wages from
04/05 to 09/10? total net spend in that period was £75M. How much do you think
Manchester United and Chelsea spent in that period? Have a guess.. Liverpool
were 5-7th in wages spend in that period.

Liverpool were torn apart financially by a leveraged buyout where even the
deposit paid for the club was on 14 points of interest. Rafa couldn't move in
the transfer market until he sold. To suggest that he was the cause of the
£300M debt that sent Liverpool broke and not the large bank loans is
disingenuous at best at clueless at worse.

He won two titles with Valencia in a league dominated by the top two - a feat
that will unlikely to be repeated any time soon. UEFA ranks England and then
Spain second. Your much-vaunted Italian league are currently ranked 4th and
about to slip to 5th behind Portugal

He is unemployed because he is waiting for the right offer. He was offered no
less than the role at Chelsea and turned it down over contract roles.

I have never heard anybody with a clue argue that Benitez is terrible. Even
his most ardent critics would begrudge him the respect he deserves (only two
other managers have won more trophies than Rafa in his last 9 years).

You can attempt to devalue the trophies he has won as much as you like, but he
won silverware that has eluded clubs who have invested billions of pounds
(which makes his +£75M at Liverpool look like peanuts).

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pigs
Apparently, the algorithm behind his rotation policy is NP-complete.

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Tycho
For a while I was convinced he was basing his strategies on Football Manager
(the PC game).

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vasco
Benítez.

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muyuu
He always was in control of the tech:

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F98Dss5f8o0>

