Enzo Maresca: Liverpool may not fully recover from Diogo Jota's death | OneFootball

The Italian had a teammate pass away while playing for Sevilla in 2007

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Chelsea head coach Enzo Maresca doubts whether Liverpool's players will ever fully recover from the loss of Diogo Jota.

The death of Jota at the age of 28 in July following a road accident was a painful reminder for Maresca of when his Sevilla team-mate Antonio Puerta died suddenly of a cardiac arrest 18 years ago.

Puerta, a wing-back who had won one cap for Spain, collapsed during a La Liga game against Getafe in August 2007 and died three days later in hospital. Maresca had also been on the pitch at the time.

Three months earlier the pair had played together as Sevilla retained the UEFA Cup, defeating Espanyol on penalties in the final - Puerta hit the winning kick in the shoot-out - a year after lifting the trophy for the first time by beating Middlesbrough.

A year ago, Maresca spoke of the pain of returning to the Olympic Stadium in Athens for Chelsea's Conference League game against Panathinaikos, the same ground where Sevilla had played a postponed Champions League qualifier a week after the death of his team-mate. The game against AEK Athens had originally been scheduled for the day that Puerta died.

As such, the Italian is all too aware of what Saturday's opponents Liverpool are going through.

"It's difficult," he said. "It's also difficult to explain because there is no solution. You have just to deal with it. You cannot be better again."

Maresca, who was a senior member of the Sevilla team in 2007, has stayed in contact with Puerta's parents ever since.

"You arrive at the training ground. You can imagine the changing room is more or less like this room. You arrive and you see that place empty where every day there was your team-mate, it's very sad," he said.

"After 20 years, it's the only thing I can say."

A visibly emotional Maresca then asked that there be no more questions on the subject.