After his move to Italy football in the summer, Rafa Benitez has tried to sign a couple of his former players from Chelsea. It was rumoured that he was interested in bringing Juan Mata to Napoli, but that would never materialised and the Spaniard has since gone to Manchester United for a club record fee of £ 37.1 million. This deal has surprised many since Mata has been one of the best players for Chelsea in the last two years. This is also the opinion of Benitez, who says that he would have never sold in the 25-year-old.
Benitez is an admirer of Mata after having played him in most of the matches when he was at Chelsea. The 25-year-old, though, never got a look in under the new management of Jose Mourinho, who has been involved in a war of words with Benitez for several years. The rivalry has been resumed after Benitez commented that Mourinho was wrong in deciding to sell the player of Mata’s quality to one of the main rivals. Eden Hazard has been made as the main man under Mourinho. The Belgian international has started in every Premier league match up until now.
Benitez won the Europa league with Chelsea last season, but Mourinho hit back saying that he does not want to win the second rated European competition.
“I am not here to talk about Chelsea. But Juan was their best player in the last two years. That is it. You can see that, but I am not here to analyse what they did,” said Benitez ahead of his return to England. He is coming back with his Napoli team, who play against Swansea in the Europa league. Napoli have dropped into this competition after finishing third in their Champions League group despite finishing with 12 points.