Rafael Benitez Quotes

For me the relationship you have with the coach is very important.

The owner or president is the person who controls the club. The coach's job is to keep him happy. But the key to success, as a manager, is your relationship with the players. Important clubs and important players succeed when the environment is correct. The players must enjoy their work and feel free to express their talents.

You can be the best manager in the world, but if the players don't trust you, it will never work.

Getting the best out of your best players gets the best out of the team.

I told our players at Butler, 'I hate to break it to you, but you aren't playing beyond here. That's reality. So why are you so concerned with yourself?' It's a hard lesson, but I told them, 'How you handle your role on this team will be remembered by your coaches and your teammates. It will define you.'

Having trust in your manager is the most important thing for a footballer.

We need to trust our coaches. Unless we trust them we can't get the result.

I think it's really important for managers to be liked by his players because ultimately, on the pitch, those players will give everything for their manager.

The most important thing for me is to value the players and try to improve them individually in order to improve the team.

A captain has to be able to look a player in the eye before he starts his run-up or goes out to bat.

Believe me, you need good people if you want to make good players.

That's how you get a performance - they put trust in you.

I think there's nothing that's not important. Everything you do - from how you connect with the guys in the locker room, to how you learn, to how you play on the field - everything's important; everything goes with the position.

I think the most important thing about coaching is that you have to have a sense of confidence about what you're doing. You have to be a salesman, and you have to get your players, particularly your leaders, to believe in what you're trying to accomplish on the basketball floor.

I realize that as the quarterback, you have to assume some sort of leadership role because you have to talk in the huddle on every play, and you're essentially giving out orders to the team. But in my mind, I have to prove myself on the field before I can start asserting a leadership role.

One of the most important things about leadership is that you have to have the kind of humility that will allow you to be coached.

It's very important in a leadership role not to place your ego at the foreground and not to judge everything in relationship to how your ego is fed.

The most important thing is that you treat everybody incredibly well and lead with a bit of humility. I've found that when I go into a company to lead, it's important to have a plan and to make that plan a simple one that everybody can understand.

As a captain, I think it's important that the players really know who you are and what you stand for, what your beliefs are, and to be consistent in those if things are going good or things are going bad.

The one thing that I know is that you win with good people.

Some players you pat their butts, some players you kick their butts, some players you leave alone.

If you're a coach, and you don't have trust with players, you've got no chance, and your credibility is zero. And that's why it's so important to tell them the truth. If you have something that you're upset about, tell them the truth. If they're doing something wrong, tell them the truth.

On the playing side, a lot of guys I played under were pretty good managers.

When I'm on the court, I'm a follower.

I hold head coaches accountable.