Rafa Benitez was regarded as one of the best managers of his time during his stint with Liverpool but the Spaniard has fallen out of favor massively with players and fans after abysmal showings in his time at Newcastle United and Everton recently. Benitez’s downfall started with his disappointing tenure at Real Madrid.
The Spaniard has opened up about his time at the Spanish club and has claimed that there were so many lies told about his tenure at the club. He talked about the internal conflicts at the club and how complicated the situation was with the departure of Iker Casillas, and Karim Benzema’s arrest and said that he bore the brunt of everything.
Talking to Spanish radio stations Cadena SER and Onda Cero, he said: “There was an unfavorable environment: the departure of Casillas, Keylor Navas, the arrest of Benzema… There are complicated situations. And when everything gets complicated, who pays? Me.”
Rafa Benitez 🎙️“I left when we were two points behind Barcelona with a game in hand. But the media acted like we were miles behind. It seemed as though we could never win [his staff at Real Madrid]. The media constantly made up stories.
“Return to Real Madrid? Almost impossible” pic.twitter.com/xwbR3HJ14h— Football & Witball ⚽🎩 (@FootballWitball) February 17, 2023
He opened up about his relationship with Cristiano Ronaldo as it was reported that the duo was not on good terms. He talked about he had a conversation with Cristiano Ronaldo about his free kicks and further stated that Ronaldo’s free-kick stats got much worse after Benitez departed from the club.
He said: “It’s my only conversation with him. Everything else is a lie. When he takes free kicks, when I leave, his stats are worse. I was surprised that journalists I knew would say that without talking to me.”
Rafa Benitez tried to fix Cristiano Ronaldo’s free kicks
There were many rumors around Benitez trying to fix Ronaldo’ free kicks and the manager opened up about it and said that he knew Ronaldo from his Manchester United days and wanted to see if something could be done about the trajectory of his free kicks. He slammed the Spanish media for false reporting and making propaganda against him.
He said: “The only comment I made to Cristiano Ronaldo, as I knew him from Manchester United, is that we analyze how he was shooting free-kicks. We looked at the trajectory, to see if we can make any adjustments, saw we couldn’t, and forgot about it.”
That isn’t an ego problem with Lewandowski, that’s an ego problem with Nagelsmann.
Lewandowski is right. 💀
Who is Nagelsmann in this sport to tell a player like him how to play? He’s clearly been very effective without the hipsters advice.
Hope this helps https://t.co/PLYdJTTKxk
— Mike (@MikeLUHG2) June 9, 2022
Benitez also opened up about his relationship with Gareth Bale and talked about reports of him favoring the Welshman over Cristiano Ronaldo and other players being totally false and there was no truth to them. He said that he only knew him from England and met him before and that was that about their relationship.
He said: “The only comment I made to Cristiano Ronaldo, as I knew him from Manchester United, is that we analyze how he was shooting free-kicks. We looked at the trajectory, to see if we can make any adjustments, saw we couldn’t, and forgot about it.”
It seems that Rafa Benitez has come hard at the Spanish media for reporting falsely against him and seems rather disappointed for being blamed for an abysmal spell at Real Madrid as he thinks there was so much else going around at the club during the time which stagnated his team’s performances