Rafa Benitez sadly recalls his work at Real Madrid: journalists lied about the conflict with Ronaldo, considers the dismissal unfair

Rafa Benitez recalled his experience as a Real Madrid coach.

On June 3, 2015, Benítez returned to Spain as manager of Madrid. The contract was concluded for three years. Despite the rather good standings of the team, already at the end of autumn there were rumors about the possible resignation of a specialist, various media published information about his conflict with team leader Ronaldo.

After a major defeat in El Clasico from Barcelona (0:4), Benitez was criticized by the fans. Despite repeated statements by Real Madrid president Florentino Perez to support Benitez, on January 4, 2016, the Spanish specialist left his post, where he was replaced by former player of the creamy Zinedine Zidane.

“I can analyze. I am looking to see if you will have support, if there is money … But finding the right project is not easy. I will not coach Liverpool because they have Jurgen Klopp and he is doing well. And I won’t be able to go to big teams because I’ve already been with their rivals,” Benitez explained.

“The offers I’ve had don’t motivate me.” But Benitez did not rule out that he would coach Atlético Madrid in the future: “There are teams that will never appoint me because I was with an opponent. Like Barcelona… But Atlético is different…”

It looks like Benitez is still feeling the sludge from his sacking from Real Madrid.

“When I was at Real Madrid, they didn’t let us win,” Benítez said. “We were first in the Champions League. In the Champions League, which Real Madrid won, we did our job.

“In the Spanish Cup, we flew out due to an administrative error with Denis Cheryshev. Then it seemed that it was my fault, because he was no longer there. The team was physically superior to rivals. When I left, they had a two-point lead over Barcelona with a game in hand. Two months later they were 12 points behind.”

“The only comment I made to Cristiano Ronaldo, whom I knew from Manchester United, was that we analyzed how he took free kicks.

We analyzed the trajectory and saw if we can make any adjustments. We realized that we could not and forgot about it. This is my only conversation with him. Everything else is a lie. As for his free throws, after I left, his statistics have deteriorated. I was surprised that journalists I knew spread rumors about conflicts without talking to me.”