Now that Rafa Benitez’s calamitous reign is over, Everton need to do two things when identifying his successor – look to the future and reclaim the club’s identity – and that means bringing in Wayne Rooney.
Benitez was never going to be the right fit for Everton – thousands of loyal, long suffering supporters who have backed the club for years before the club’s current players and power brokers arrived and will be there long after they’re gone were saying that before he even took charge but owner Farhad Moshiri did not listen.
Like he’d done with Sam Allardyce, the Iranian-born businessman chose not to heed the warnings from others when it came to hiring his personal choice.
Except this was the most-controversial appointment in the history of England’s most-passionate football city.
Like elephants, football fans do not forget and – quite rightly – many Evertonians weren’t prepared to overlook Benitez's petulant “small club” jibe from back in 2007 when David Moyes’ side frustrated his Liverpool team at Anfield in a goalless draw (oh for such resolute defending today).
The vast majority of moderate supporters though – like they would with whoever the club they love chose to appoint – were prepared to reserve judgement and give Benitez a chance.
That’s clear, despite what fellow Spaniard and self-confessed Liverpool admirer Guillem Balague continues to spout about the apple of his footballing eye.
It was a sequence of shocking results that brought a swift end to Benitez’s time at Everton NOT his previous employment at Stanley Park that ended over a decade ago.
But should we even be surprised?
Personally I feared he’d underwhelm and even at the peak of his powers the football played by his teams was seldom free-flowing but nobody, not even the likes of Richard Keys and Don Hutchison, who himself represented both Merseyside giants, who each said it would “end in tears” could have surely predicted it was going to be this bad?
While Kopites rubbed their hands in glee over ‘Agent’ Rafa bringing an Everton side that was second in the Premier League table little over a year ago to 15 th place, once more chanting his name during the home match with Brentford when they news of his sacking broke, like they’d done during their side’s 4-1 win at Goodison on December 1, the truth is that here was a 61-year-old manager, now long past his best and struggling to operate in a sport that has moved on from his own glory days.
Whatever you think about Benitez, he is a man of integrity and like you have to be in his profession, someone of great self-belief.
Others felt Everton were just another convenient and lucrative stop for him on his doorstep as he edged closer to retirement age but he would have genuinely believed he was able to revive their fortunes.
In a similar manner to the way he took on an albeit interim position at Chelsea where he knew significant sections of the fanbase were never going to like him because of his Anfield connections, Benitez’s stubborn streak will have made him think ‘I’ll show you.’
And why not?
Arsenal and Tottenham had Terry Neill AND George Graham manage both; Alex McLeish went directly from Birmingham City to Aston Villa; the aforementioned Sam Allardyce managed both Newcastle United and Sunderland; Harry Redknapp did Portsmouth, Southampton then back to Portsmouth again; Manchester United’s legendary manager Matt Busby was a former City player while former Manchester City manager Mark Hughes was an ex-United player and Steve Bruce has made a managerial career of flitting between rival clubs (Sheffield United & Sheffield Wednesday; Birmingham City & Aston Villa; Sunderland & Newcastle United).
In that respect, the crossing of Stanley Park was the last great taboo in English football given that Dubliner William Barclay, a Victorian pioneer listed as ‘managing’ Everton between 1888-89 and Liverpool between 1892-96 was in reality just secretary-manager at Everton who don’t list their first official manager until Theo Kelly in 1939.
It’s not like this was Steven Gerrard coming to the Goodison Park hotseat either.
Despite his family being based on the Wirral since 2004 and Benitez claiming that local knowledge helped him to know what Evertonians wanted, as a Spaniard, the Madrid-born boss maintained a certain amount of distance.
After all, had Everton legend Howard Kendall, who quit the club for Athletic Bilbao after steering the Blues to a second title in 1987 later sought employment with their Basque rivals Real Sociedad, would he have actually not have been able to serve them with just as much commitment?
It wasn’t for lack of trying that Benitez failed, rather a fading through age of his managerial powers.
Some hailed him a lucky manager as if that were a good thing but the brace of trophies he delivered for Liverpool were more down to the super-human efforts of the aforementioned Gerrard in the 2005 Champions League final and 2006 FA Cup final than his own acumen against a Milan side that other than a crazy six-minute spell outplayed them and a very ordinary West Ham outfit who suffered a sucker punch landed by the Reds’ captain’s once-in-a-lifetime late strike.
It shouldn’t be forgotten that Evertonians dubbed their future boss Rafael ‘Beneath Us’ back in 2005 as Moyes’ team finished above their European champion neighbours in the table that season and Benitez arguably won the wrong Champions League final given Liverpool faced a by now ageing Milan who were there for the taking in 2007 but lost with fingers being pointed over the manager’s defensive line-up.
Newcastle fans might have enjoyed something of a love affair with Benitez and point to his successor having spent more money than him but his two Premier League points totals at St James’ Park mirrored exactly those of Bruce (44 and 45) and don’t forget he also took the Magpies down in 2016.
Newcastle had been next-to-bottom of the table at the time of Benitez’s appointment on March 11 but they were only a point from safety at the time with a game in hand on their rivals and 10 matches left to turn things around.
He also came to Everton on the back of a disappointing record at his previous job with Dalian Pro, losing 18 of his 38 games.
Benitez’s defenders might suggest that working in China is a difficult barometer when judging someone for the Premier League but maybe the warning signs were already there.
So from a manager ‘on the wane’ to Wayne the manager.
Rooney is among the bookmakers’ favourites to be the next Blues boss and as bizarre as that might have seemed just a few weeks ago, there appears to be a growing appetite among Evertonians that their former home-grown hero then turncoat then Prodigal Son might now be ready for another dramatic Goodison Park return.
After the bitter taste of the Benitez experience and having to endure the humiliation and detachment of him at the helm of their club, the browbeaten fanbase need to get their identity back.
Some are championing the cause for Duncan Ferguson but while the Tartan talisman is capable of providing the kind of fist-pumping shot in the arm he delivered for the tumultuous victory over a Chelsea side managed by Frank Lampard – who also curiously appears on the shortlist of supposed candidates – drafting in an untried manager for an entire half-season seems a huge risk given Everton’s perilous position.
Ferguson could always get up for the big games as we saw from his own playing career but with relegation now a realistic fear, can Mr Moshiri really gamble Everton’s Premier League status with a rookie in the dugout?
He might live in Monaco but given the Blues owner’s caution when hiring Allardyce in less precarious circumstances back in 2017, it seems unlikely he’d actually throw the dice on that one.
Ferguson has served in the first team coaching staff under Roberto Martinez, Ronald Koeman, Allardyce, Marco Silva, Carlo Ancelotti and now Benitez but he’s reached the age of 50 without being in a senior post.
Rooney in contrast was thrown in at the deep end at Derby County, a crisis club who make even Everton look like a smooth, well-oiled machine.
Keeping the Rams up in the Championship on the final day of last season, he’s performed miracles so far this term despite their 21-point deduction.
Despite such demoralising circumstances, Rooney has actually guided Derby to more victories than defeats so far in 2021/22 (eight to seven) and if it wasn’t for their off-the-field punishment, they’d be in the top half of the table rather than the relegation zone.
Under Mr Moshiri, the Blues have struggled under a series of older and, other than Allardyce, overseas, managers but history shows us that when the club have been successful it’s been under the stewardship of one of their own and preferably a younger man with fresh ideas.
Kendall was three days off his 38th birthday at the time of his first trophy; Harry Catterick was 43 and Joe Royle 46.
At 36, there are with Rooney, echoes of Kendall, who was 35 when he came back to Goodison as player-boss in 1981 having served his managerial apprenticeship at Blackburn Rovers.
Some might have seen him as an unlikely candidate to succeed in management but he is a born winner who collected every trophy in the club game under Sir Alex Ferguson at Manchester United having started off under Moyes and perhaps their respective tutelage is paying off with his own approach in the dugout.
It’s not an ideal situation for any manager, particularly a young one, to go into at Everton – far from it – but perhaps destiny is moving for Rooney to ironically make it at his boyhood club as a manager rather than a player given the two truncated spells at Goodison that bookended his time as a Premier League footballer.
One thing we know Mr Moshiri does like is a big name with star quality.
Instead of looking to the past and the same jaded cartel of managerial luminaries, it’s now time to embrace the future and bring in a manager who can give Everton their identity back and grow with the team as they prepare for the move to the new stadium which is taking shape at Bramley-Moore Dock.
Before Ancelotti emerged in December 2019, I was saying the Blues should go for Mikel Arteta.
Now I’m backing Rooney to bring the change of direction and breath of fresh air they so desperately need.
