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Opinion

I don’t want Rafa Benitez to stay at Newcastle United unless these major changes happen

5 years ago
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Rafa Benitez is the name on everybody’s lips.

Is he going to extend his stay on Tyneside?

Only 11 days until he is due to take charge of his final match and exactly 60 days until this current three year contract ends.

I’m guessing sometime between that Fulham match and the end of June, is when we will find out.

It is of course a total (unfunny) joke that we aren’t already excitedly discussing what these next three, four, five years are going to bring, but that is Mike Ashley for you.

A new deal should have been agreed long before now, as Rafa Benitez has said this past week. Every day is a waste whilst this uncertainty drags on.

All of the other clubs, including no doubt Norwich and Sheffield United, are already planning/preparing for this summer and next season.

The reality is though that nothing of significance can happen if you don’t even know who the manager is going to be.

Everybody is saying ‘Rafa must stay’ but is it really that simple?

I really want Rafa Benitez to remain Newcastle United manager BUT only if the circumstances are right.

Unless Mike Ashley is selling up (preferably) or there is major movement in how he sees the club being run, what would be the point?

Do you really want to see the club stumbling along, with Rafa Benitez just about keeping us afloat in the Premier League?

To experience transfer window after transfer window thinking what could have been, whilst the manager is having to rummage around in the bargain bins and loan market for the latest cut price signings that might just about do enough to retain Premier League status. To see Rafa’s frustration at the end of each window.

As Newcastle fans we don’t expect success but we do expect to be able to dream.

To be able to dream of the club progressing  and maybe even one day finding itself in a position where just maybe, a trophy could be won and/or European football returning.

None of that though can be possible even if Rafa Benitez stays, if everything else stays the same.

If Mike Ashley won’t go/change, then I would rather the manager left and Ashley could get on with the job of ruining the club. If Ashley can’t even see that retaining Benitez is a no-brainer, then we are better off hitting rock bottom as soon as possible, if that is what it will take for this owner to move on.

He as already brought about two relegations and plenty of near misses, if Newcastle go down a third time, then I don’t think it will be anything like as straightforward as Mike Ashley seems to assume it will be, judging by how happy he is to gamble with Premier League status.

Back in 2008 would you have preferred Kevin Keegan to stay at St James Park, putting up with the disgraceful way the club was being run and he was being undermined? By leaving, KK exposed to us just how rotten everything was/is, rather than stay and keep the lid on it.

Eleven years later and the club is still a shambles and the manager is being undermined, if that is not going to change, then Rafa must go, not Rafa must stay.

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