{"id":3000,"date":"2026-09-02T20:56:45","date_gmt":"2026-09-02T20:56:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/footballars.xyz\/?p=3000"},"modified":"2026-09-02T20:56:45","modified_gmt":"2026-09-02T20:56:45","slug":"weve-met-a-few-times-rafa-benitez-discusses-relationship-with-rival-jose-mourinho-amid-part-excitement-at-special-one-joining-benfica","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/footballars.xyz\/?p=3000","title":{"rendered":"&#8216;We&#8217;ve met a few times&#8217; &#8211; Rafa Benitez discusses relationship with rival Jose Mourinho amid &#8216;part-excitement&#8217; at Special One joining Benfica"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div data-testid=\"article-body\">\n<div>\n<p>When asked about Mourinho\u2019s homecoming, Benitez could not hide his &#8220;part excitement&#8221; as revealed to <em>The Telegraph.\u00a0<\/em>Pressed on whether the animosity has softened over the years, Benitez made it clear the rivalry may have mellowed, but it never truly faded.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019ve met a few times with Uefa meetings and it is OK, but nothing like that. We\u2019ve never spoken about those games,&#8221; he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>From ghost goals to penalty shootouts, Liverpool versus Chelsea in the mid-2000s defined European nights. And central to it all were Benitez and Mourinho, locked in an unrelenting battle of wits.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.goal.com\/en-ng\/lists\/rafa-benitez-discusses-relationship-with-rival-jose-mourinho-benfica\/bltfc646e9643ca67b6\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When asked about Mourinho\u2019s homecoming, Benitez could not hide his &#8220;part excitement&#8221; as revealed to&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3001,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3000","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-chelsea"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/footballars.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3000","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/footballars.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/footballars.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/footballars.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/footballars.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3000"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/footballars.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3000\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/footballars.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3001"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/footballars.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3000"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/footballars.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3000"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/footballars.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3000"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}