Ricardo Quaresma, one of Beşiktaş’s legendary football players, made remarkable statements on the black-and-white club’s YouTube channel.
Quaresma said in his statement: “I think Beşiktaş players should show more respect to the club and the fans. The old stadium was better for me. It was more scary for the players who came to play against us. I miss the old stadium.
“I DID NOT WANT TO LEAVE”
If I wasn’t in the starting 11, I would get upset with the coaches. So, I would sit on the bench away from them. I didn’t want to leave Beşiktaş. It was a difficult, complicated, sad and boring time.
There were nervous players at halftime of the Benfica match. We felt that if we could score early we could change the match. We started with a great goal. We continued our dominant game after the goal. If we had 5 more minutes we would have won. I was very angry when I entered the locker room. Because it was a Portuguese team. I don’t like to lose against Portuguese clubs. My biggest rival was Benfica. I kicked the garbage can.
“IT WAS THE FIRST TIME I EXPERIENCED THIS”
I scored the goal in the last minutes of the Beşiktaş-Porto match and we won 1-0. I had a great match that day. What surprised me the most was if the stadium hadn’t started chanting my name when the match ended. This is not normal, because I was a Porto player. This stunned me. At the end of the match, I was walking towards the tunnel. A Beşiktaş official told me to give my Porto jersey to one of the Beşiktaş fans. When I handed over the jersey, the whole stadium started chanting my name. This impressed me greatly. I was very happy because it was my first time experiencing something like this. And the truth is that fate cannot be escaped.”
