Sportsmail's Jim Mansell, a fervent but despairing Liverpool fan, pens an open letter to his club's manager after their humiliating Champions League defeat to Marseille at Anfield:
Dear Mr Benitez, I felt compelled to write to you following Liverpool's abject display against Marseille.
I have a fear that you are blind to the one key element which is vital to any successful team - consistency.
In my view the Champions League defeat on Wednesday hardly matters a jot - though not to qualify for the knockout stages would be humiliating enough - but was a clear manifestation of the problems thrown up by your baffling rotation system.
Let's be frank. Your changes are infuriating Liverpool fans. I haven't spoken to one who thinks it's the right policy or that it will win us the prize we most cherish - the Premier League.
We've been waiting since 1990 for a sniff of the Holy Grail - and gritted our teeth as Manchester United, Arsenal and Chelsea have dominated.
They have done it by moulding teams which play at a high level of consistency. Barring loss of form and injury, the manager has picked virtually the same players week in, week out.
They became teams and a developed a pattern of play to suit.
Currently, this does not seem to apply to Liverpool. You made another bucketload of changes for the Marseille game from the team that scraped a 1-0 away win at Wigan. Not surprisingly, they played like strangers. As Robin van Persie said this week Arsenal benefit by having the same team because the players like it that way.
How can Crouch be expected to perform if he's hardly given a look-in? How can Torres be the 20-goals-a-season striker the team desperately needs if he's not in the starting line-up for games against the likes of Portsmouth and Birmingham? How can the midfield develop an understanding if it's chopped and changed so much?
I heard you say in an interview recently that your policy was designed to ensure the players were in peak fitness for the run-in to the Champions League and the title.
That's no good if the team are not in contention for either due to poor performances in the rest of the season.
Your summer buys gave us hope that the title would be a realistic target. The season started brightly. Don't let that flicker of hope be extinguished so quickly.
On behalf of all title-starved Liverpool fans, pick a team to win the league and stick with it.
You gave us a truly unbelievable triumph in Istanbul. And a memorably nerve-wracking FA Cup success. But, Mr. Benitez, we're desperate to be the best team in the Premier League.
What we can't stomach is a rotation policy which will see the names of just United, Chelsea and Arsenal on the Premier League trophy for another 17 years!
Dear Mr Benitez, I felt compelled to write to you following Liverpool's abject display against Marseille.
I have a fear that you are blind to the one key element which is vital to any successful team - consistency.
In my view the Champions League defeat on Wednesday hardly matters a jot - though not to qualify for the knockout stages would be humiliating enough - but was a clear manifestation of the problems thrown up by your baffling rotation system.
Let's be frank. Your changes are infuriating Liverpool fans. I haven't spoken to one who thinks it's the right policy or that it will win us the prize we most cherish - the Premier League.
We've been waiting since 1990 for a sniff of the Holy Grail - and gritted our teeth as Manchester United, Arsenal and Chelsea have dominated.
They have done it by moulding teams which play at a high level of consistency. Barring loss of form and injury, the manager has picked virtually the same players week in, week out.
They became teams and a developed a pattern of play to suit.
Currently, this does not seem to apply to Liverpool. You made another bucketload of changes for the Marseille game from the team that scraped a 1-0 away win at Wigan. Not surprisingly, they played like strangers. As Robin van Persie said this week Arsenal benefit by having the same team because the players like it that way.
How can Crouch be expected to perform if he's hardly given a look-in? How can Torres be the 20-goals-a-season striker the team desperately needs if he's not in the starting line-up for games against the likes of Portsmouth and Birmingham? How can the midfield develop an understanding if it's chopped and changed so much?
I heard you say in an interview recently that your policy was designed to ensure the players were in peak fitness for the run-in to the Champions League and the title.
That's no good if the team are not in contention for either due to poor performances in the rest of the season.
Your summer buys gave us hope that the title would be a realistic target. The season started brightly. Don't let that flicker of hope be extinguished so quickly.
On behalf of all title-starved Liverpool fans, pick a team to win the league and stick with it.
You gave us a truly unbelievable triumph in Istanbul. And a memorably nerve-wracking FA Cup success. But, Mr. Benitez, we're desperate to be the best team in the Premier League.
What we can't stomach is a rotation policy which will see the names of just United, Chelsea and Arsenal on the Premier League trophy for another 17 years!
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