Rafa Benitez has left Newcastle and is on the brink of becoming the Dalian Yifang manager, but he lifted the lid on some details from his time at Newcastle in an interview with George Caulkin in the Times.
Benitez said that he wanted to stay at Newcastle “100%” and that he didn’t ask for £100million to spend on players in the summer as had been suggested.
“I didn’t ask for any money,” Benitez said. “I just wanted to know how much [there was]. The club put out some information about the budget being around £50million plus the money from sales and that was fine. I wasn’t complaining. I knew it was the reality. It was about managing the budget you have — that was the key.”
When the offer came through from Newcastle it gave him less control over transfers and he said that it didn’t feel like the club wanted him to stay.
Benitez also explained the manner of his departure, admitting that he sent an email to Lee Charnley saying he wouldn’t sign a new deal with the club.
He got a reply but he wasn’t told an official statement would be going out.
“I knew I was leaving,” Benitez said. “I had been clear in what I’d said to them. But it was the fact they didn’t say, ‘okay, we understand that and we’re putting out a statement’. It was a simple thing they could have done.”
One other fascinating detail is that he only met Mike Ashley four or five times in his entire time at the club.
“I didn’t have a problem with Mike Ashley because he wasn’t around,” Benitez revealed. “Maybe I met him four or five times.”
OPINION
It’s the end of an era at Newcastle and the Times interview is a brilliant insight into the manager and what happened at the club – from his point of view, of course. The revelation that he only met Ashley four or five times seems scarcely believable but shows the level of interest Ashley takes in the day-to-day running of the club. It’s easy to take Benitez’s side in the saga and certainly, that’s where Newcastle fans will end up. But there is an alternative view, that football is a business and Ashley is a successful businessman. It might be a unique business, with fans providing a lot of the revenue and demanding much in return, but it’s still a business. You can look at Man City’s football on the pitch and see the beauty in the game but it comes at a price. Man City is owned by Sheikh Mansour and it would be a push to suggest that his loyalties lie beyond winning and the potential money to be made. Unfortunately for Newcastle fans, Ashley doesn’t share the same approach or have as much money.