Rafa Benitez has less than three months remaining on his current contract as manager of NUFC. With the end of the season fast approaching, are Rafa and Mike Ashley headed for a stalemate this summer?
This weekend sees the Premier League’s 32nd match-week commence. Newcastle, fresh from a fantastic away draw with Bournemouth, are looking to upset the odds to beat a strong Arsenal side at the Emirates Stadium on Monday. With the club currently in 13th place on 35 points, surely another two wins from the remaining six games will see Newcastle secure another season in the Premier League. The club also announced this week that they will take part in the Premier League Asia trophy in Hong Kong this summer as part of their pre-season preparations.
Newcastle United are planning for a future in the top flight of English football, whilst also aiming to increase their commercial awareness in the Far East. It all sounds positive, doesn’t it?
There is, however, one major burning question on the lips of Newcastle fans around the world; “Will Rafa Benitez be Newcastle manager beyond the end of this season? ”
Rafa is holding out on agreeing to a new contract unless the conditions are right to allow the club to compete. It seems once more, both Rafa and Mike Ashley have begun a staring contest to see who blinks first.
Mr. Ashley, Newcastle’s much maligned owner, is acutely aware that keeping Rafa Benitez at Newcastle will continue the club’s current run in the Premier League. Much more important to the club’s owner is the money that the Premier League generates for his business. The thought of a further relegation before he can sell the club, which has been on the market for 18 months now, is a worrying threat to the asset he owns. However, Mike Ashely is also a shrewd and tough businessman who, as Newcastle fans know, has no issue with making unpopular business decisions.
In this staring contest, Rafa Benitez is very aware of this fact. Rafa lives and breathes football. He’s an elite manager in world football and has won most trophies in the game. Rafa is also a fantastic tactician at a boardroom level and is used to political battles within clubs – Valencia, Liverpool, and Inter Milan being prime examples of this.
Benitez is holding out to see an overall change of policy within the club that will allow him to affect all footballing areas. Recently after 3 years, the club has finally began implementation of his vision for a more structured approach to the Newcastle United youth system. This will, in the future, allow the club’s academy to attract the brightest and best young footballers and nurture them into the first team.
This is one small step, but only one of the many areas that Benitez feels need to be changed to create the right conditions for the club to compete regularly in the top half of the Premier League.
The question that still burns is; “How many of Rafa’s conditions is Mike Ashley prepared to commit to, and if he’s not prepared to meet them, will he let Rafa walk away in the summer?”
It’s an unthinkable scenario that this will happen. At present, Rafa is the glue that is holding Newcastle together and keeping it united. Fan tension and vitriol against Mike Ashley continues to bubble under the surface, with a possible fan mutiny in the summer a very real possibility if Rafa were to walk.
Mike Ashley, ever claiming to be the pantomime villain, may refuse to blink first with Rafa so blatantly challenging him on a business front. Rafa, knowing that he may have taken the club as far as the owner will let him, may decide to choose his head over his heart this time and decide that enough is enough.
Rafa Benitez and Mike Ashley are both stubborn. When it comes to the season’s close it’s a very possible scenario that neither will back down and the stalemate all fans dread will become a reality.