SERIUS PUNYA ANALISIS!

ROTATION TALK IS A MYTH
Paul Tomkins
08 August 2007

Rather than rotation being the rot that eats away at the core of Liverpool's title challenges, it's the criticism that's rotten.
You don't believe me? Read on ... In his new role as Setanta Sports' analyst, ex-Red Steve McManaman stated a few weeks ago that Benítez needed to rotate less to win the league. He was far from alone in expressing that belief; I don't mean to single him out, but he was just the first to mention it this pre-season. I can barely turn on a sports channel or read a newspaper opinion piece without hearing it trotted out like some brainwashing mantra. No wonder people believe it. I even stopped reading the Premier League previews, and just searched for the word 'rotation' within. A couple of times it didn't appear in a piece; upon further investigation, another phrase had been chosen to explain Benitez's 'folly'. Same accusations, different wording. It's become received wisdom, passed on in acts of laziness that pass as analysis. Rotation is by its nature difficult to assess, as often you cannot say for sure if players were rested, suspended, injured, or left out for essential tactical purposes. Only the management know why team selections are made, as well as how the players were looking in training in the build up. Long gone are the days of settled sides and 14 players featuring all season long. For Benitez, any team change is labelled 'rotation'. And of course, rotation is only mentioned after defeats, never after long runs of victories. Benitez was criticised during 2006/07 for having named his 99th consecutive altered line-up, but none of the critics bothered to check that he'd actually won a stunning percentage of those 99 games. Obviously everyone knows Benitez rotates more than anyone else? (Ergo: way too much.) It's a known fact, right? Except, of course, it's not true. Manchester United won last season's league title with Alex Ferguson having made a total of 118 changes to his Premiership line-ups throughout the campaign, at an average of 3.11 changes per game. The season before that, Chelsea won the league with Mourinho also having made 118 changes to his Premiership line-ups throughout the campaign, again (obviously) at an average of 3.11 changes per game. So how many changes did Benitez make in 2006/07? You guessed it, 118 changes to his Premiership line-ups throughout the campaign, at what the eagle-eyed among you will know recognise as an average of 3.11 changes per game. Ah, but in 2005/06, Benitez must of gone crazy with the rotation? Indeed he did, with an outrageous and outlandish 119 changes, at an average of 3.13 changes per game: a miniscule 0.02 more than the last two title-winning teams. So why is there this unerring torrent of punditry telling us Benitez rotates so much more than his rivals? As an example, in the pre-season friendly against Shanghai Shenhua last Friday, experts Trevor Francis and Gary McAllister (who can be partially excused on account of being a hugely likeable Liverpool demi-legend, and also for being a fellow member of the bald community) both noted that Benitez rotated too often. So did the game's commentator. Of course, the above figures don't take into account rotation that occurs in other competitions, in games played between Premiership matches. In that sense, it is indeed true that Benitez changes his team fractionally more than Mourinho and Ferguson, freshening things up for the cups. And, the Spaniard could argue, with some justification, given the Reds' record in Europe and the FA Cup in that time. But the fact remains that Benitez has kept his Premier League team selections as consistent as Ferguson and Mourinho. In terms of rotation, there's been nothing to separate them. Yes, Benitez's line-ups are often difficult to predict. But there is far more consistency to his league selections than he is given credit for. This is proof that rotation has not been what has cost Liverpool the league title. The fact that Ferguson named an unchanged team in the league four times last season - something Benitez never did - suggests the United man's ability to keep a settled side at least on the odd occasion. But in those four games United's results were well below their overall season average, and way below the ultra-high average racked up on the nine times he made three changes. So for Ferguson, three changes were far better than none. Indeed, it's worth pointing out that Liverpool's best points average came when Benitez made four changes from the previous league match: at an average of 2.5 points in those six games, it shows a rate consistent with a final total of 95 points. That doesn't mean he should make four changes every game, just for the sake of it, but it does highlight that for him, making the right changes worked. So perhaps Benitez's fault is that he rotates his key players more often? Or switches his strikers around more than anyone else? Surely this has to be the case? As Gary McAllister said on Sky, Ferguson keeps a core of his players in the team at all times, something Benítez never did. Well, the truth is very different. It's clear that whenever Jamie Carragher, Pepe Reina and Steven Gerrard were fit, they were almost always selected, at least up until the April/May 'ease off'. As his three most indispensable players, they were never rotated, just rested on occasion or absent through injury. Finnan, Alonso, Riise and Kuyt also started the vast majority of games. Indeed, Gerrard started a whopping 92 per cent of Liverpool's league matches, and was on for a 100 per cent attendance record until Benítez rested him on the 35th, 36th and 37th games of the season, with Athens looming. Pepe Reina also started 92 per cent of the matches. Neither Manchester United or Liverpool had a player with a 100 per cent league-starts rating during last season, but out of United and Liverpool's squads, Gerrard and Reina came closest, with the Reds' Carragher next in line, with an 89 per cent start rate. United had no one who started more than 87 cent of league games. So it was Benitez who had a more settled core of indispensable players. Overall, both teams had six 'ultra-key' players who started in the vast majority (76-99 per cent) of league games; Chelsea, by contrast, had only four (injuries to Petr Cech and John Terry lowered this from the expected six). Then come the fairly indispensable players: those who started 50-75 per cent of matches. Again Liverpool had six players in this category, but United only had four (Chelsea had six). So, while Chelsea and Manchester United only had ten players who started the majority of league matches, Liverpool had 12. (As an example, centre-backs Agger and Hyypia both started 23 league games, but Carragher was the main man with 34. Agger and Hyypia tended to be rotated, but on four occasions all three started.) This can be looked at in one of two ways: Ferguson had a slightly smaller core of key players he would always call on; while Benitez had two more 'important' players who featured very heavily. While Benitez used 26 players in total, Ferguson used 25, so there's little difference there. Even looking at those who were little more than bit-part players, it's virtually identical; both had 10 players who started less than 25 per cent of Premiership games, many of these in the dead rubbers in late April and early May. As for strikers, Benitez only really rotated between three - Kuyt, Crouch and Bellamy - until the final three games of the season; before then, the fourth striker, Robbie Fowler, started only three times, and only once between the fourth and 35th matches; as such, for the league he was hardly considered until there was nothing left to play for. By contrast, Ferguson rotated between four strikers. Rooney (like Kuyt at Liverpool) started the majority of matches, but Saha, Solskjaer and Larsson were switched and swapped regularly, particularly over the winter (Larsson's only time at the club). Alan Smith, returning from injury, also started the last six games of the season, to add a fifth name to Ferguson's rotation roster. (Both teams occasionally used midfielders as second-strikers.) None of this is to say that Benitez picked the perfect team every game (no manager does). Or that rotating is perfect, and leads to success all the time, or that alternating strikers doesn't run the risk of them losing confidence, but it's such a difficult thing to judge. It requires a long-term overview, rather than a knee-jerk response after any given defeat. And it also requires a proper assessment, rather than merely regurgitating misconceptions based on Benitez's reputation from Spain. Let me repeat: Liverpool have not lost the league title under Benitez due to rotation. While I always suspected this, even I was surprised at what I found when looking through all the top teams' line-ups, and at how identical they were in terms of changes made. The league was lost last year largely because of inconsistent finishing, particularly away from Anfield, from all areas of the team. There was also the defensive uncertainty at the start of the season, where ring-rustiness and injuries occurred when an unprecedented fixture list that sent the Reds to Everton, Chelsea, Arsenal, Manchester United and Bolton (where a terrible decision cost the Reds) in the first six away games, as well as the up-and-at-'em approach of a fired-up, newly-promoted Sheffield United. Liverpool's key players had not had a summer off for three seasons, and had played more games than any of United's players in that time. Gerrard and Carragher spoke of not being anywhere near as fresh as they now feel, which bodes so much better for this campaign. Also missing was that complete centre-forward, like Fernando Torres, who could combine lethal pace with all-round ability. Someone who could really stretch defences and create chances out of nothing. Of course, as Chelsea's squad cost three times as much as Liverpool's, and United's almost twice as much, the odds were stacked in the favour of those two teams contesting the title. Those clubs still have far more expensive squads, but Benitez has been able to bring in some top-class players this summer. This suggests that when Benitez rotates this season, he will always be introducing quality into the line-up. So perhaps rotating less is not the key –– given Benitez rotates to an identical level of his rivals –– just having a better squad to rotate with. And that certainly appears to be the case now. So - will this article, and the facts within, stop the deluge of inaccuracies? I doubt it. But it would be nice to see at least one sports writer or pundit pause before trotting out the same old cliches. Of course, even better would be a 19th league title come May.