A former Liverpool player has blasted Rafa Benitez for how the ex-Reds boss treated him in the run-up to their Champions League final victory in 2005 – revealing that the Spaniard also cost him £200,000.
Liverpool’s famous win against AC Milan in Istanbul has gone down in history as one of the greatest sporting comebacks ever.
The Reds turned around a 3-0 deficit to beat the Serie A side in the most dramatic of circumstances, but it was a bittersweet moment for several Liverpool’s players who were omitted from the matchday squad for the final by Benitez.
The Spaniard, who had joined Liverpool in 2004, had taken the Merseyside outfit on an excellent run during the European tournament, with the Reds beating Bayer Leverkusen, Juventus and Chelsea on their way to the final.
Yet, one ex-Liverpool star and boyhood fan of the club described the way Benitez treated him in the lead-up to the final as an ‘absolute disgrace’.
A former Liverpool player has blasted ex-Reds boss Rafa Benitez, calling him a ‘coward’
Benitez guided Liverpool to a dramatic comeback victory in the 2005 Champions League final
But one player has hit out at the manager for how he was treated in the build-up to the match
Speaking on the Under the Cosh podcast, Stephen Warnock hit out at Benitez, after he was withdrawn from the squad to play in the final, despite the manager having previously named him in the 18-man matchday team.
He had told his family to book plane tickets to Turkey, before stating that Benitez’s assistant, Pako Ayestaran, called him to deliver the tough news that the management had made a mistake on the squad. He added that he was no longer included in the team.
On the podcast, Warnock called Benitez a ‘f***ing coward’ for not calling him up personally to deliver the news.
The 42-year-old, who hails from Ormskirk in Merseyside, had been named in the squads for all of Liverpool’s Champions League matches in the run-up to the final – making four appearances during the tournament.
‘It was hard for me because I’m a Liverpool fan, I grew up standing in the Kop and everything. I thought “I f***ing hate this team, like what’s going on here”. I was fuming, I was so angry,’ he stated on the Under The Cosh podcast.
‘I didn’t hate the team, I hated Rafa. I sat there thinking, “I’m so happy for the lads, but I’m also p***ed off with the way things have played out”.’
The defender, a graduate of the Liverpool academy, made 67 appearances across all competitions for the Reds, before leaving the club in 2007 for Blackburn Rovers.
After rising through the ranks at Melwood, he would go on to be handed his Premier League debut by Benitez during a 1-1 draw against Tottenham in 2004.
Warnock added that he had ‘massive respect for the Spaniard’ for giving him his debut at his boyhood club, but also revealed that the manager’s decision to omit him from the Champions League final squad saw him miss out on a huge sum of money.
Stephen Warnock was omitted from the squad to play in Istanbul and blasted Benitez for how it was handled
Warnock admitted his devastation after he had missed out on Liverpool’s open-top bus parade
Benitez’s decision to omit Warnock had also cost the player an eye-watering £200,000 bonus
He stated that each player in the 18-man squad for the final would receive a bonus of £200,000 if Liverpool won. If they had lost, they would have each still pocketed a cool £100,000.
The left-back flew out to Turkey to watch his side play from the stands but also claimed that he was forced to watch the trophy parade around his home city on Sky Sports.
‘I remember that night just going to bed and they said, “right, the plane leaves at this time in the morning to go for the parade in Liverpool”. And then they changed it and said, “all the squad who were involved, the 18, and their wives or girlfriends.”
‘So they put all them together, bearing in mind they’d been on our flight coming over, the wives and girlfriends, and we flew back separately. Missed the parade, I watched it on Sky Sports.
‘Our flight was late coming in. The lads literally landed at Liverpool Airport, got ferried to the buses and then just started the parade. I just remember thinking “what a s***show”.’