Coaching Napoli will be even tougher for Rafael Benitez than bossing Inter, says club legend Ciro Ferrara.
Coaching Napoli will be even tougher for Rafael Benitez than bossing Inter, says club legend Ciro Ferrara.
The Spaniard has been appointed as the new tactician at the Stadio San Paolo after he left Chelsea and Walter Mazzarri quit the Azzurri for the Beneamata.
“His Inter experience will serve him well even if Naples is something different,” Ferrara told the ANSA news agency.
“It’s probably an even tougher place in which to work, but a much more exciting place for a Coach like him.
“I’m sure that he will settle well and I hope he will be allowed the time necessary to set up the team as he wants.
“Napoli finished in second place this season and to improve would mean first – that won’t be easy.”
Benitez, who has been succeeded at Chelsea by Jose Mourinho, actually replaced the Portuguese at Inter in the summer of 2010. He left on Christmas Eve months later.
“From a technical point of view the choice of Benitez is absolutely in line with the profile that Napoli wants, especially internationally,” Ferrara added. “From that point of view he is a guarantee.
“The city of Naples lives football in a particular way. It is as beautiful as it is hard to work here. There is great pressure and Benitez must therefore not only be good on the pitch, but off it too.”
Napoli are set to change shape given that Mazzarri’s three-man defence will probably be switched to a four.
“I don’t think that will represent a great problem, but, like always, it all depends on results,” Ferrara added. “If they are not good then the change will be viewed as a failure.”
Ferrara, a former Coach of Juventus, the Italian Under-21 side and Sampdoria, won two Scudetti as a player with Napoli.