We all like to look back at by gone and better days when our clubs are going through a rough spell, and on this day, March 11 2016, Rafa Benitez walked into Newcastle fans lives leaving us in a state of shock bewilderment.
At least that was my sentiment “how the fuck have we got him” was my first thought “is he fucking mental” was the next.
I couldn’t believe it, we’d actually got a manager who was world class, won it all, done it all, he’s forgotten more about football than most have remembered.
Most importantly though he wasn’t the latest in a long line of fuck nuggets who’d been put in charge of the club. He oozed class, charm and charisma, everything previous Newcastle managers weren’t.
We’d given ourselves the best chance at getting out of the hole Steve McClaren had left us in, I’m not taking aim at God himself but if Mr Shearer, my boyhood hero was appointed too late and couldn’t get us out of the mess the first time we went down, there was the smallest of niggling worry in the back of my mind, that even the man who’d seen it and done it all couldn’t stop the relegation train.
I had a stern look at myself in the mirror and came to realisation that Rafael fucking Benitez was Newcastle manager.
Performances improved but it was too late to save us from going down again.
The 5-1 home win against Spurs on the last day of the season is one that will live long in my memory, the entire ground singing his name for 90 minutes, and for a long time after, that love and affection from the fans helped in persuading him to stay, I’d resigned myself to losing him, “he’s too good to manage in the Championship.”
To everybody’s shock he stayed, and stuck by the club and the fans that had in 3 months absolutely fallen in love with him. That Championship season was one of the best I can remember, and pipping Villa to the title was more than sweet. Sob on the Tyne? Wankers.
We stayed up in our first year back in the Premier League and the message the entire time was hope, there’s hope for more, hope for better times, a galvanised and successful Newcastle United is brilliant for English football and the Premier League.
A man with a plan, he saw the potential in the club, he saw the potential in us the fans, he knew what 52,000 people all singing from the same page could achieve.
Can you imagine Rafa calling out the fans? “Mass hysteria” Rafa’s idea of doing it his way being “getting us 20 yards up the pitch” or after a defeat saying “we’ll roll wa sleeves up and go again” and laughing and joking with the opposition manager while he walked down the tunnel, fuck no, he is better than that, respects the fans more and has bucket loads of dignity. Something our current manager lacks.
I was gutted when he left, but as usual Ashley and Penfold fucked it up for everybody, let the best thing that’s happened to that club in a decade walk away without a fight, not a fight from Rafa, but a fight from the gutless people in charge, too scared to see what could be, instead of the club being no more than free advertising for his cheap tat shops.
The whole thing being yet another fuck up from a club that’s fucked up everything its done in the last 13 years, from buying one senior player after finishing 5th, to measuring success as finishing 17th, that’s not my Newcastle, that’s not your Newcastle, that’s their Newcastle, a hollow shell of a club with no soul, much as it pains me to say that.
So reminisce of the good times, and as my Dad always says, leave them wanting more, and leave with the door open, the door will never be shut to Rafa from the fans perspective, and we all wanted much more from him, a chance denied to us by a greedy money pinching owner.
Remember we we’re told Benitez didn’t want Joelinton, I rest my case!
We now have to look forward to hoping Fulham, West Brom and Brighton lose so we can keep our heads above water for another week, that’s not the Newcastle I fell in love with when I was 5, standing outside the old wooden cabin that was the club shop, being in awe of Ruel Fox walking past us, or seeing Les Ferdinand drive out of the ground in his TVR, getting in the car in Suffolk after school with my Dad and driving up to St James’ for an evening kick off.
There will come a time when things are better, a time when we don’t have Shit Direct plastered all over the ground, a manager with ambition, not just a bargain bin appointment who is scared to push back against the owner, a time when hope can become a reality. And that’s all we ask for, hope, that’s what Rafa gave us, hope.
Cheers, The Fat Man
Fat Lad Sports 