As I've said before though in this day and age of 'fans' and supposed 'supporters' - he probably will get kicked into touch and then they'll be bleating about the 'yes man' the idiotic owners have installed to do their bidding without rocking the boat.
Someone posted a rumour about Hiddink - exactly the sort of fan, media friendly 'yes man' who you describe there, a thought so depressing I find myself half beleiving it will happen.
So many people want to see us use 'tried and tested methods'. Don't these people get that there's other teams using those methods already, who have more money than us, and better players to do them with?
Rafa is a true original, an innovator. In terms of skills needed to do the kind of impossible job he's been tasked with here, there is no-one else who comes remotely close to being as suited as the man we already have in charge. The only others like him are a young breed of interesting mangers, several of whom cite Rafa as one of their main influences.
It's like our prize is on a very high shelf - our rivals have massive ladders that reach that shelf. What are we going to do? Hiddink, though I've no doubt he could motivate us short term to top 4, say, is the equivalent of buying a shorter ladder because that's all we can afford.
Rafa is trying to build us a jet pack. Yes, it's difficult. Yes, it looks stupid when it goes wrong. Yes, it's complicated and harder to understand than a ladder. But what choice do we have? The other option is to basically just give up on the prize, and settle for the shelves below, all of which are well stocked with mediocrity.
We should be giving Rafa whatever tools he asks for. Instead, he's been trying to build that jet pack with components for a ladder. He's finally got the owners to accept the need for the jet pack, and now they won't give him the money for it - money they did give to incompetent cowboy ladder builder Parry.
Yet instead of taking a step back and seeing the bigger picture, backing our rocket man and taking aim at our owners, we're on the verge of forcing him out, replacing him with some over-rated ladder afficionado, and once again shooting ourselves in both feet with a fucking machine gun, the kind of insane decision making that has characterised our utter joke of a board for two decades now.
Two fucking decades, and in all that time, the only one who really scaled the heights, showed us how pretty the view is from up there again is Rafa Benitez - the only one who's brought home one of the big two our legend is built on. The only one who's put a mark in the history books that will live on alongside our true greats.
Are these people going to show an ounce of contrition, of 'mea culpa'...are they going to learn from this and apply the lessons if the fear's of Rafa's fans are proved correct? Are they fuck. They're going to take aim at the next poor bastard while telling all and sundry about how stupid we were to let Rafa go in the first place.
As for Rafa himself, he'll take some time out, recover from the emotional pain, take stock, pick the best of the slurry of offers he will inevitably get as the most highly rated manager in Europe (and he is, outside of Britain fans and media rate him as numero uno, the big kahuna - he will be inundated with offers from the very biggest, Inter, with the media love spud moron in charge, would sack him in an instant to get Rafa, because Moratti craves what Rafa is more likely than anyone else to get him - CL glory), he will set conditions, and finally get the backing he needs - not so much financial but just to be left to do what he needs to do his way without bullshit - and I would bet that he will build that club into something huge, something that will make him a living legend with the fans of that club, just like he is to Valencia's fans, and (thankfully still) to many of ours.
The media will respond to this with a bout of the collective amnesia they do so well, and use Rafa's success and his successors lack of it as yet another stick to beat us with, while probably mounting another hysterical campaigng to get our new man out. Why? Because it sells and because they can.
Fuck that. Rafa is the man, and I really hope we don't all realise just how much the man he is only after he's left.
