Real Betis manager Manuel Pellegrini has admitted he sent a text to Chelea manager Enzo Maresca after the Europa Conference League draw on Friday.
ABC Sevilla cover comments from the Betis boss, in which he joked he’s sent a text to his former assistant about the draw.
Both Chelsea and Betis are through to the knockout stages of the Europa League, with the next set of fixtures set to take place next month.
There had been talk beforehand about a potential meeting between the two sides and the intrigue of that given it would see Pellegrini coming up against a manager who was once his assistant at West Ham.
Instead, the draw had other ideas as Betis were paired with Vitória Guimarães and Chelsea with Danish side FC Copenhagen.
It means the master and apprentice will have to wait to meet each other, with te full bracket keeping the two sides apart until the final if they both get there.
It seems that Pellegrini was not even a little disappointed by that fact, as he admitted he’d text the Chelsea boss after the draw was made.
“I Msaid before the draw, I don’t care what the rival was,” he said.
I wish it would not have been Chelsea, especially by Enzo Maresca. If we run into the final, better. They are equally complicated rivals; they left in the upper area of the group and hopefully these two games are focused on Getafe and Real Madrid.
“I sent him a message and told him that we meet in the final. I don’t look at whether it’s easy or difficult, I look at whether there is a higher or lower performance.
“The surprises are there, we are not confident or scared. We will try to win Vitoria, and we are not thinking about anything that does not correspond to the sporting aspect.”
