Former Chelsea manager Rafa Benitez believes that his stay at Stamford Bridge was sabotaged by the fans of the Blues, according to ESPN.
Rafa Benitez was hired as the manager of Chelsea following the sacking of then manager Roberto Di Matteo in 2012 but the Spaniard stayed for only six months at Stamford Bridge, despite winning the Europa League and finishing third in the league.
It was believed back then that the fans’ hatred for Benitez was the main reason for Chelsea’s decision to not offer the full time contract to the Spaniard.
While Benitez managed to win over some of the fans with his finish at Chelsea, there was a section of the club faithful who were critical of the Spaniard due to past history and it was believed that this section of the vocal fans were the ones who convinced the Blues ownership to not offer a permanent deal to ex-Liverpool boss.
This has left a lot of “what ifs” in the story between Benitez and Chelsea and the Spaniard reflected on this upon his return to Stamford as the manager of Newcastle United on Saturday.
Benitez told reporters, “All the feedback that I had from the professionals and the board was very positive. They couldn’t manage with what happened with some fans. Most fans realised the best way was to stay calm and let us do our job. We achieved what they were expecting.
“In the end, they had to decide and decided they had to change. Initially, he brought me to save the team and to achieve what we did achieve. Afterwards, they thought they had to change and they did.”
“A teenager in the Czech Republic put on Twitter that I once said I would never manage Chelsea, but that is simply not true. Then this story was created.
“My relationship with Abramovich was really good, with the people of the board was really good. They knew that we were professionals and we were doing our job. We were achieving what they expected.
“We won the Europa League. Everything was fine. The majority of fans were happy. But maybe some of them, because of my past with Liverpool, they were unhappy.”
