Thoughtful Thursday: Is Liverpool’s weakness its Spanish mentality?

Portsmouth, Reading, Stoke City, and now Wolverhampton Wanderers. As Liverpool fans are asking the football gods what they have done to deserve this, they should really be looking towards the club’s leader, Rafa Benitez, for answers.

Now I am not a football xenophobe, far from it. I think the Italian and Portuguese influences on the Premier League’s style of play has only improved with the diffusion of tactical ideologies. And do not get me wrong, Spanish players have certainly contributed to the ever-increase in the Premier League’s popularity. But I cannot say that the Spanish mentality has ever truly succeeded in England.

Now I am not talking about the modern mentality of the Spanish national team that went undefeated in World Cup Qualifying after winning the Euros. I am rather focusing in on the historical mentality of the Spaniards, an awful disposition that saw great Spanish teams fail time after time to live up to their potential.

You might ask, “Rafa Benitez won the Champions League with Liverpool, how much more success could you ask of Spanish manager?”

Brian Clough believed that winning the domestic title was more valuable than anything else, simply because it demanded the most mental and tactical strength from the manager and the players. Rafa Benitez has been shining in the light of his Champions League trophy for so long that it is just now that the Liverpool faithful are just beginning to realize that he has not been nearly as successful in the Premiership as in Europe.

After Spain won the Euros in 2008, we saw the footballing nation’s mindset evolve before our very eyes. Unfortunately, Rafa Benitez is part of the dying breed of the old-school Spanish manager. Rafa’s type is the one that has never seen Spain get past the World Cup semi-finals, a side that, in a sense, has never eclipsed its own “top-four” boundary.

With the likes of Fernando Torres, Steven Gerrard, and Javier Mascherano, Liverpool has the potential to be as good as anybody. Focused on his own inanimate Spanish ideology that rightfully prioritizes a style of play with skill and technique, Rafa Benitez is ignorant of all the other great methodologies developed by today’s Premier League managers, who are, tactically, some of the managerial geniuses of our time.

This old Spanish mindset that refuses to learn and grow from previous mistakes exemplifies why Rafa simply does not have what it takes to thrive under the modern demands of the world’s most competitive league.

Can Spanish tactics succeed despite the demanding nature of the Premier League, or should Liverpool stop trying to implement a hopeless system? Comments below please.