Benitez can improve Inter – Materazzi

(GSM) – Internazionale defender Marco Materazzi believes new coach Rafael Benitez can improve the team after the very succesful José Mourinho era.

Benitez arrived from Liverpool this summer to succeed Mourinho, who is ‘irreplaceable’, according to Materazzi. The 36-year-old was very close to the Portuguese manager and was even seen crying with him in a tearful embrace after the Champions League Final in Madrid.

When asked for his opinion of Benitez, Materazzi told La Gazzetta dello Sport: “I’ll judge him in a year’s time, like I did with Mourinho. I am not used to saying ‘I like, I don’t like’ after a week also because it’s only when things get difficult that you see what everyone is made of.

“After two years I can say that Mourinho is unique, the No 1. Inimitable. Even if the real phenomenon, and I have said it before, was Moratti in the sense that he paid Mourinho €18m and then asked Real to pay €16m for him: he had the best Coach for two years for €2m.

“More than anything, Benitez has been intelligent to underline that he is different from Mourinho and I don’t believe that you can get angry if this team is still tied to Mourinho: all the world has seen and knows how we left each other.

“I have been saying it for a while. I will put in the same effort. I will always be at the service of the team and be in harmony with Benitez like with Mourinho. We mustn’t look back. Rafa will have to get closer to the team and continue to think like he did at Liverpool.

“The first thing to do is win because we still miss winning something – in truth, not a lot but we still want to do it of course.

“Benitez has a constant desire to explain his vision of football, the desire to find how to improve players who are even 37, players like me.”