Name: Antonio Benítez Fernández
Country:
SpainClub: Real Betis Balompié
Position: *SB, WB, SMF, WF
Side: LF/BS
Age: 23-26 years (21/06/1951)
Height: 170 cm
Weight: 71 kg
Attack: 77
Defence: 73
Balance: 84
Stamina: 86
Top Speed: 83
Acceleration: 85
Response: 77
Agility: 81
Dribble Accuracy: 80
Dribble Speed: 84
Short Pass Accuracy: 78
Short Pass Speed: 81
Long Pass Accuracy: 78
Long Pass Speed: 83
Shot Accuracy: 73
Shot Power: 86
Shot Technique: 74
Free Kick Accuracy: 74
Curling: 73
Header: 68
Jump: 75
Technique: 85
Aggression: 81
Mentality: 90
Goalkeeper Skills: 50
Team Work: 81
Injury Tolerance: B
Condition: 7
Weak Foot Accuracy: 8
Weak Foot Frequency: 8
Consistency: 5
Growth Type: Standard/Lasting
CARDS:
P07 - Early Cross
S05 - 1-Touch Play
SPECIAL ABILITIES: Side - 1-touch Pass
Attack/Defence Awareness Card: Attack-Minded
INFO:
A genius who amazed the fans for his technique, for his dribbling, for his infinite quality and for his powerful physical condition. Captain on many occasions, his class, overflow and versatility allowed him to act in very different positions of the field. A prodigy who hit the ball equally well with both legs (and with a very strong shot too) and who became an international with the Spanish team playing as a fast and strong winger and as a fullback on both left and right side! Filigree in footballer, he possessed an unusual quality, which made him a footballer from another galaxy in technical matters. As inevitably happens when analysing the figure of a genius, its main ballast lay in an irregularity that despaired its most faithful. In the image of a unique team, Benitez alternated great performances with incomprehensible birds. The solution to this riddle can only be found by the football gods.
Benitez was part of Real Betis for fourteen seasons. He arrived at the club when he was only eighteen years old, in 1970, from the sports team of his locality, Jerez Deportivo. Thanks to his qualities as a fast and skilled player with the ball, he carved a place in the starting eleven of Antonio Barrios, sharing the grass with players of the stature and experience of Rogelio, Frigols or Quino. His position on the pitch will change over the years, going from occupying a position in the midfield to later being on the side of the Betis defence. In his early years at the Club, Benítez experienced the joys of promotion to the First Division in the 1970-70 and 1973-74 seasons, along with more difficult seasons such as 1972-73 with the team's relegation to second.
The great triumph with the green-and-white shirt comes when he was already a seasoned footballer, in the 1976-77 season, with the conquest of the Copa del Rey. In the final match highlights his outstanding performance as a left winger, in which he managed to recover the second goal that was conceded to the Betis team. In his 14 seasons at Betis Antonio Benítez played 302 league games, scoring 22 goals, 59 Cup, in which he scored 5 goals, 4 of the Cup Winners' Cup and 109 friendlies, in which he scored 14 goals.
Benitez was capped three times during the Ladislao Kubala era. In the first of them as a winger against the Argentine national team on October 12, 1974; match that ended with the tie to a goal. Three years later, already in the position of defender, he acted as a starter of the National Team in two meetings against the combined of Switzerland and Romania, with Two Spanish victories by 1-2 and 2-0 in Bern and Madrid respectively.
Benítez retired from active football in the 1982-83 season, from which he will dedicate himself to coaching teams of lower echelons always within the Betis entity.
Spoiler: show