Perhaps the best encapsulation of the reaction to Carlo Ancelotti’s sacking by Real Madrid has been provided by former Los Blancos star Ivan Helguera.
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As a man who made more than 300 appearances for the club and won nine trophies – including two Champions League crowns – Helguera knows what he is talking about.
And his response to club president Florentino Perez’s ruthless axing of his popular Italian coach neatly illustrated the baffled response from many.
“New coach?” wrote Helguera on Twitter. “New project? Youth system? Signings? Planning?” And, for added emphasis, he then finished with no less than 39 question marks.
Entrenador nuevo? Proyecto nuevo?cantera?fichajes?planificación??????????????????????????????????????? pic.twitter.com/Jrl60rr7Hb
— ivan helguera (@ivanhelguera1) May 25, 2015
The message is clear, and it is one that many Madridistas are repeating: Senor Perez: what on earth are you doing?
Perez says the club needs a new impetus, but he does not state how, or what that impetus should provide.
If anything, the “new impetus” required is not a new coach, but at presidential level where Perez appears to have little long-term strategy for sporting success other than signing a succession of glamorous, fashionable and highly-priced attacking players who might or might not fit the actual needs of the squad.
The hard truth is that the six years of Perez’s second presidential spell at the Bernabeu have seen just one league title and one Champions League success (yielded by Ancelotti, the man he has just sacked).
That is nowhere near good enough for a club of Madrid’s size and status – there is no way he would allow a manager to survive for so long with such meagre returns – and if that record partially reflects failings at a coaching level it also, surely, speaks badly of Perez’s stewardship and his ability to make important football decisions.
The dismissal of Ancelotti – who less than six months ago became the first ever Madrid coach to win four trophies in a single calendar year – does nothing to assuage those doubts.
If Perez had jettisoned the Italian to take a different approach and appoint a man who would lead a long-term ‘project’, it would be more understandable.
If, for example, Madrid were now preparing to appoint the available, charismatic and hungry Jurgen Klopp, a man who has clearly demonstrated his ability to cleverly construct a coherent team with a clearly identifiable style of play, Ancelotti’s departure would make sense.
Such an appointment would suggest that Perez is ready to abandon his trophy-signings mentality and hand over the reins of the team to a new coach and allow him to undertake a serious and strategic reshaping of the club’s playing philosophy.
Instead, it appears that Perez’s “new impetus” will involve handing one of the biggest jobs in world football to Rafa Benitez, a man who has achieved little of note in the last decade.
He is a capable pair of hands who can look after a team sensibly but has become in recent years a rent-a-coach, popping up for short spells at various clubs to oversee moderate success without leaving a lasting trace of his stewardship.
That, perhaps, makes Benitez just right for Perez, who will continue to pull the club’s strings and will be able to easily sack Benitez when he fancies giving Zinedine Zidane a go in a year or two.
But it doesn’t necessarily make Benitez right for Real Madrid. And if he fails, it will be the president’s responsibility.
