The Ogre is no longer the coach of Malevo and will take over at Newell’s. He left the club and wrote a heartfelt letter on his Instagram account. Gustavo Benítez, a reference for the institution, already took over Tuesday’s training.
The defeat against Sarmiento de Junín was Cristian Fabbiani’s last game at the helm of Deportivo Riestra. The Ogre, who had a great campaign at Malevo, will be the coach of Newell’s after the dismissal of Mariano Soso due to poor results. The now former coach said goodbye to the club with an emotional message on his Instagram account. On the other hand, Gustavo “Tata” Benítez took over as the new coach of the team that is playing its second season in the First Division of Argentine soccer.
Although he said he had “the strength and conviction to continue” after the defeat in the Rosario derby against Central, Soso’s time at the Lepra was numbered. The management arranged his release this Monday, with Fabbiani’s offer already accepted. It is worth remembering that the Ogro had a stint as a player for the institution in the 2008 Apertura, where he played 15 games and scored five goals.
Although he did not want to talk to journalists about his new step in his career, if there are no problems his move to the Rosario team will be sealed. “I don’t know what’s going to happen. If I have to leave, it seems disrespectful to say it now at the conference, because I don’t have time to think now. Yes, when I return to Buenos Aires,” he had said yesterday after the defeat against Sarmiento.
The native of Ciudad Evita began his career as a coach in Fénix, went through Riestra when it was in the Primera Nacional, managed Deportivo Merlo and returned to Malevo at the beginning of 2024. In his second cycle there he had a great campaign, accumulating 13 wins, 17 draws and 15 losses. Last year he moved the team away from the last places in the annual table, while in the Apertura 2025 he left it in fifth place in Zone B after six days. He is aware that his leap as a coach was made at the Bajo Flores institution and he is very grateful to them. For this reason, he dedicated a heartfelt publication to them on his Instagram account.
“Today I have to say goodbye to this beautiful club that was my home for so long: Deportivo Riestra. Thank you. I would especially like to thank Victor (Stinfale), who was the first to trust my work when no one else did and who encouraged me in my career as a technical director in the First Division. Thanks to Diego Figueroa, the club manager, who was always by my side and in every detail I needed to feel comfortable at the club. Thanks to all the directors and all the people who work at La Candela non-stop so that Riestra continues to grow as an institution. Thanks to the kit men for so much dedication on a day-to-day basis. Thanks to the people and the fans for supporting this team in every game, and finally thanks to them, to the players, who are and were the protagonists of my time at the club. They are a group of excellent people who give their all in every training session and in every game, I feel nothing but pride for you and I wish you the greatest success always, until we meet again. Cristian the Ogre Fabbiani,” he said in a message full of thanks.
Later, the club’s official social networks shared the last chat of the former coach with his players. “I’m going to miss you and I hope you do well. I know that without you it will be impossible to achieve what is happening to me. You made the preseasons hard, the training sessions during the week, you made everything very easy for me. I believe in my heart that you have a unique mystique, I’ve never seen it in football; it’s not to suck up to you, but what you do in other clubs is not done. Give value to what they are achieving because they achieved something with humility,” he said with a somewhat broken voice.
Riestra moved quickly and already has a new coach. It is Gustavo Benítez, an idol of the institution who has been there since 2016 and was involved in the promotions to the Primera Nacional in 2017 and to the Professional League in 2023.
Tata played the role of team manager in the professional squad: he served as a link between the coaching staff, the management and the footballers. Once the Ogro’s departure was consummated, he took charge of the professional squad, this Tuesday he carried out his first training session and next Friday at 5 pm he will debut in his new position against Talleres.
El Pupi, vice president of the Italian team, anticipated the duel that will take place in the middle of the year with a warning to his club. “I know how Gallardo’s teams play,” he added as an analysis.
Although River is thinking about its next match against San Martín de San Juan, it knows that in a couple of months it will be paying all its attention to the Club World Cup. Inter will be one of its rivals in Group E of the tournament and Javier Zanetti, vice president of the Italian club, knows that he must be careful with Marcelo Gallardo’s Millonario.
“It will be very nice to face River because I know the history it has in the country. It will be a difficult rival,” began the former full-back of the Argentine National Team. The match between the team from Núñez and the neroazzurro will be the third in the group stage – on June 25 in Seattle, at 10 p.m. in Argentina – so both could face each other already knowing their future in the world competition.
Then, by way of analysis, Pupi stated that he is observing Marcelo Gallardo’s team in the 2025 Apertura Tournament: “I know him well and how his teams play. He always tries to have the leading role in the match and he has the players to do so. He is an opponent to be careful of. I hope Inter is playing at a good level of football to be able to face him.”
When they met in the draw, and joked that they were going to meet, Zanetti had anticipated that he would convey to the Inter players “what this type of competition means for an Argentine team.”
Finally, the vice president of Inter made a reflection on Argentine football and the view from Europe: “Argentina never has to lose its raw material, because it is immense. There is a lot of variety and it is not for nothing that many European teams go to our country to buy players, because they know that the Argentine player adapts to any situation. If you play in an important club, personality is the first thing they look at.”
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