Tuesday, May 11, 2010

Dirk Kuyt Believes Rafael Benitez Will Be At Liverpool Next Season

Liverpool forward Dirk Kuyt believes that manager Rafael Benitez will still be at Anfield next season despite the reports linking the Spaniard with Juventus.

The Dutchman also sees it as vital that the Reds hold on to players such as Steven Gerrard and Fernando Torres, both of whom have been linked with big money moves away from Merseyside in recent days.

"The manager has four years left on his contract, so I don’t expect him to leave unless something else happens," the Dutch international told The Liverpool Echo.

"For me, the most important thing is keeping the main players.

Hopefully then we can buy a few more key players and start winning trophies."

Kuyt also acknowledged that the Reds have made too many mistakes this season and it is vital that they learn from them quickly.

A 0-0 draw at Hull City on the concluding Sunday of the season consigned the Merseysiders to a seventh-placed finish, meaning that they face the ignominy of having to play in the qualifying rounds of the Europa League next season.

Kuyt believes that the players must be honest and take their share of the blame, before lifting themselves to face a new season with resolve and determination to succeed.

"It has been a hard season and we did everything to change things," the Dutchman added.

“Up until 10 days ago, we were fighting for a trophy but it didn’t happen. You can say we have to forget what has happened but, really, we have to learn from the mistakes we made. We’ve got to push next season and be bouncing from the start.

“In football, you can never be sure what is happening and at this time, we know the club looks very bad. We are looking for new owners and you don’t know which players are going to stay or go.

“But Liverpool is a club with a great history and great supporters and we have to stay close together and fight really hard.

“Every player is interested in what is going on but, if I am honest, I can’t blame that side of things for some of our performances.

"We tried to stay focused with things on the pitch – that’s what I did, as did everyone else. We just couldn’t make good things happen for the club."

The draw at Hull also frustrated Kuyt, who wanted to end the season with a victory to cheer the fans.

“We were all hoping to finish the season with a good result so we had some kind of good feeling to finish on but unfortunately that did not happen," he said.

"Stevie [Gerrard] went close and we had a couple of other chances.

"We pushed hard but we didn’t get the result we wanted and that is disappointing."

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