The interview now released by Liga TV was Rui Costa’s intervention at the Thinking Football Summit meeting (September 2023), having been recovered by Liga Portugal for the launch of its new platform.
At the time, before the group stage of the Champions League began, Rui Costa had said that, despite it seeming “a utopia”, he should dream of winning the Champions League.
“Not to nurture this dream in a club of this size and magnitude would be stupid,” said the president of Benfica, in September.
At the time, to demonstrate how difficult it is to win the competition, he even pointed to the example of Manchester City, which, despite its financial power, had only managed to win the trophy last season.
The entire interview has now been released by Liga TV.
The financial issue was also a topic when talking about the possibility of returning some of the most loved and appreciated players to Benfica by the fans.
«Even today we talk about players that our partners and fans want to see wearing our shirt again. The players themselves have already demonstrated this, but people have to understand that in the vast majority of cases this doesn’t even reach the player’s side, because there is no agreement between clubs. Benfica is not in a position to reach Manchester City and pay 100 million euros for a player, talking about the case of Bernardo Silva”, he stated.
Rui Costa recalled his personal case, when, throughout the years of his career in Italy, he always had the desire to end his career at Benfica, only ending up coming at a late stage and at no cost to the club.
“When I went to Milan, and the prices had nothing to do with what they pay now, the club paid 43 million euros,” he recalled. This, in addition to the fact that, when he left Luz, he even took photographs with the Barcelona shirt, having ended up going to Italy, since «Fiorentina offered more money to Benfica and the club was in a precarious situation».
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