We ran a poll on Twitter last week, asking our readers and followers wether they would like to see Rafa Benitez return to the club under the potential new owners.
It follows recent claims from Sky Sports’ Keith Downie that an approach for Rafa by Amanda Staveley’s consortium was “inevitable”.
The Spaniard was said to have been a big factor in Staveley’s interest before her failed bid back in 2017, and according to Downie and a few other sources he is still very much in her thinking.
Here are the results of our poll – which gathered just shy almost 1,200 votes – seeing 80% say ‘YES’ and 20% ‘NO’:
As the results highlight, Rafa remains hugely popular amongst the majority of Newcastle fans, despite leaving last summer for a lucrative deal in China following 3 years of being at loggerheads with Ashley and Charnley.
While 80% would have him back, the comments, and indeed discussions on other social media groups have been mixed.
Some think he walked away and that should be it done. Other opinions range from doubts over his style of play, to believing the club should look forward and in a different direction to usher in the new era.
Some feel Steve Bruce has done well enough to deserve a crack with a more ambitious transfer budget.
I also heard someone make a very good point that it would cost around £20m to buy him out of his contract at Dalian Yifang, and he has never left a club whilst under contract previously in his career.
There have been other names mentioned such as former Juve manager Max Allegri and former Spurs manager Mauricio Pochettino. Wether there is actually anything is these links, or it’s purely lazy journalism because they are both currently out of work remains to be seen, but either way it’s still exciting to see us linked with names of that calibre.
Feel free to put your comments up and tell us what you think.
It would have been interesting seeing the results of Rafa pipped against some of the others mentioned to see if he came out as preferred option.
Sharpy17(Quote)
Funny you say that mate as we ran a poll on that just yesterday (Rafa, Poch, Allegri or ‘other’) along with a few others. Pretty sure Rafa won the vote!
Full results will be shared in articles soon.
Olly Hawkins(Quote)
Rafa produced a miracle with the (lack of)resources and funding he was allowed. No money for an effective offence, he created a defence which made us hard to beat and a goal difference which, unlike at present, always allowed optimism that it would keep us in the prem. It leaves the question – with adequate funding for proper attackers, not affordable stop gaps, what might Rafa have achieved?
NB spelling police – whether, not wether!
Tony Toon(Quote)
You didn’t ask the right people then. Let’s face facts. Rafa was **** for the toon. Showed no tactical skills. Showed no offensive skills but yes his defensive skills were amazing and boring as **** but only because he played 11 in defence nearly every game. Lack of funding or not he showed as much ambition as Ashley and I was glad to see him go. Even Bruce has done a better job and actual has us playing some kind of football rather than that **** Rafa gave us week in week out. We were lucky to have won the championship. And once back in the prem we were always looking at a relegation fight so no I don’t want him back and I certainly wouldn’t be funding him to buy big players.
Danny(Quote)
Yes Danny – he did badly at liverpool ect, didn’t he
t gibson(Quote)
Just want the takeover to be completed, then i’ll worry about the next manager at this point.
John(Quote)
Prefer we went after Allegri
Peter Hajzyk(Quote)
Danny, that’s an absolutely horrendous take on Rafa Benitez, and Steve Bruce too for that matter.
You’re allowed to dislike Benitez’s style and wish for a more offensive-minded manager, but come on!..
Olly Hawkins(Quote)