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Marco Silva, the former coach for English football club Fulham, was appointed as the manager of Benfica on a two-year deal, announced the club on Friday.
Silva, who comes as a replacement for legendary manager Jose Mourinho, who left the Portuguese shores for a return to Spanish football giants Real Madrid, has an option to extend his deal for another year, as per the club's official website. Silva was previously associated with Fulham from 2021 26, leading them from the second division of the English football to the Premier League. In the last concluded season, Fulham finished in 11th place. Marco had also been associated with Estoril (2011-14), Sporting CP (2014-15), Olympiacos (2015-16), Hull City (2017), Watford (2017-18) and Everton (2018-19) before taking up the Fulham gig in 2021. Besides achieving a Premier League spot again, Fulham became much more stable under Silva, reaching the quarterfinals of the FA Cup twice in 2022/23 and 2024/25, respectively. In the previous season, Benfica finished in third place in the Primeira Liga, Portugal's top-tier league, under Mourinho. They were eight points short of the champions FC Porto, who topped the charts with 88 points. The club president, Rui Costa, said, as per the team's website, "We officially announce Marco Silva as the new coach of Sport Lisboa e Benfica. Welcome to Sport Lisboa e Benfica. Your success will be the success of millions of Benfica fans. It will be the joy of millions of Benfica fans. Welcome to a place very dear to all of us. Let us begin with a very beautiful chapter in Benfica's history, and may this Museum have more trophies next year than it has today ." Silva also said, "We want to be a dominant team, a team capable of connecting Benfica's greatest strength, which is its fans, to the team. That is our main objective: to achieve a very strong connection. The great support that the fans give to the Benfica team will only increase if the team responds. I am not talking about compromise or demandingness, because that is an obligation; it is not even negotiable. I am talking about a positive way of playing, a dominant way of playing, which, in my opinion, is what Benfica represents." (ANI)
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