Is Benitez actually the best Everton could get
So the club had a choice to make. They could go back to a younger and relatively unproven coach – like Marco Silva- in the hope he would be able to build a long-term strategy for success. There were several individuals who met that profile such as Christophe Galtier and Graham Potter.
But that didn’t seem to be a risk that Moshiri (and Alisher Usmanov) were ultimately prepared to take with a new stadium being built at huge cost and the vital importance of having a competitive team on the pitch when it opens in three years time.
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So they wanted someone who was a repeat past winner, with plenty of Premier League experience and the kind of profile and connections that would resemble Ancelotti, the least risky bet.
The only candidate then in the end who matched that criteria was Benitez. Let’s be honest the Toffees can’t play kamikaze attacking football next season without massive investment in the team and turnover of personel as they will get slaughted.
In some ways I think Everton’s position resembles their greatest rivals and neighbours when they hired the Spaniard in 2004.
Ok the Reds had got fourth, but they were 30 points adrift of champions Arsenal having suffered ten league defeats and seemed a long way from competing with the Gunners, Chelsea and Manchester United.
Everton finished last season with 59 points one less than Liverpool then, although in tenth place in a more competitive Premier League.
Without trying to labour the parallels, it did look as though Liverpool were a fading power at that point in time. Benitez was pragmatic and cautious at first but he built a very strong and exciting side at Anfield, which could and probably should have won the title in the 2008-09 season.
It’s still a huge risk of course. And apart from the obvious PR problem Moshiri and the club have, the question is will we get the Benitez who turned an ordinary Liverpool team into European champions fifteen years ago, or a coach now only really suited to struggling mid or lower-table teams (is that Everton’s future!) whose tactics and mentality, like Jose Mourinho, are outdated?