With Liverpool’s debts crippling the clubs ability to compete in the transfer market, the suggestion was put to Rafa that the owners could see a potential sale of Torres as a way to lower the club’s debt.
Benitez said:
“It won’t happen. I’d quit.”
Rumours have been circulating over the past 24 hours that the reds must make another large repayment to RBS in January, on top of the £60M that they were forced to pay in the summer. The reds are likely to aim to reduce the size of the squad to do this, meaning Benitez will have no transfer budget in the transfer window.
He will, again, have to firstly arrange player sales as early as possible to see how much is in the increasingly meagre Liverpool piggy-bank.
If Real Madrid dispense with the services of Manuel Pellegrini then it is likely that they will make their fourth offer to secure Rafa as manager, but after turning down three job offers already Rafa insisted:
“I want to leave a winning legacy (at Liverpool).
“People are worried. But the team will improve. When we have key players on the pitch we are as good as anyone. We have proved this in the past.”
Rafa went on to defend his transfer record which has been the subject of some exceptionally dishonest reporting in the press.
“When we have spent big, normally it’s been very good business. Torres, Mascherano, Reina, Alonso. Keane is a good player but we had to sell him because he was not playing at the level we knew he could play. Ryan was signed for the future and we are waiting for his improvement. He has to be more consistent.
“With the fringe players, we needed to take a gamble on Bosmans and one, two million-pound players. Some of these players have not been good enough for us. It is a risk you have to accept when there is not too much money about.”