Something rare, and rather precious, seems certain to happen at Anfield on Saturday afternoon. When Rafael Benítez emerges from the tunnel, Newcastle United’s manager can expect to be greeted by a heart-warming wall of sound from all four sides of the ground that he once called home.

As Liverpool fans join their Tyneside counterparts in lauding the manager, local memories will drift back to Istanbul and that Champions League triumph. Fans will also reflect on the stellar work which continues to be done by the Montse Benítez Foundation – a charitable organisation funding assorted good causes on Merseyside – and her husband’s £96,000 donation to the Hillsborough Family Support Group.

To locals, Benítez was much more than just a manager who won the Champions League, the European Super Cup and the FA Cup while also coming tantalisingly close to securing the Premier League title. If they were pleased that he and his wife Montse – whose family home remains on the Wirral – had clearly fallen in love with the area, Merseysiders also appreciated the Spaniard’s slightly subversive, anti-authority streak. His stature was only enhanced by a real willingness to play politics and stand up to Liverpool’s detested former owners, Tom Hicks and George Gillett.

Ultimately that debilitating battle brought his six-year Anfield idyll to an end but the 56-year-old’s legacy endures. “Rafa will be welcomed back with open arms and rightly so,” says Kenny Dalglish, another man who has managed both Liverpool and Newcastle. “It isn’t just about the trophies Rafa won, it’s about a legacy we’re still reaping the rewards of today. The benefits of the changes he put in place at the academy are still being seen – you only have to look at some of the players in the first team squad. I’m sure Jürgen Klopp appreciates the contribution Rafa made.”

It is almost three years since Benítez’s last return to Anfield – which was the Spaniard’s first since departing in 2010 – when his Chelsea side drew 2-2 in a game featuring a late Liverpool equaliser from Luis Suárez, who would later apologise for having bitten Branislav Ivanovic. More significantly, the visiting manager paid an evocative tribute to the late Hillsborough justice campaigner Anne Williams and looked close to tears as the Kop sang “You’ll never walk alone”.

If the chemistry at Chelsea – where he won the Europa League and memorably survived telling Roman Abramovich off for merely giving him the title “interim manager” – was never right, Newcastle seems an almost Liverpool-esque fit.

Delighted by the arrival of a manager who not only promises to be a real match for the club’s autocratic owner Mike Ashley but seems capable of restoring their team to former, far distant, glories, St James’ Park regulars are fast falling in love. Indeed, the only fear – the big black cloud on the horizon – is that, should Newcastle go down, he will exercise the break clause in his contract and leave them with tortured, tantalising, thoughts of what might have been.

“At the moment we’re in honeymoon,” acknowledges Benítez, who hopes to choreograph Newcastle’s first win at Anfield for 22 years. “I’m really pleased with things. Hopefully it can be the same for some years. I see the similarities with Liverpool, between the cities and the fans. Newcastle fans have passion; I like that. Liverpool was fantastic because the fans are behind you no matter what you do, what mistakes you make.

“ I hope I’ll get a good reception at Anfield. My connection with the city is fantastic, my family lives there and we have a foundation helping people, but Newcastle have to win.

“Staying up would be massive – and the beginning of something special for this club. Yes, I love Liverpool but I love Newcastle too at the moment – and I hope that will be the case for many years. To stay at a club where the fans love you is really important to me.”

He is adamant he will not feel even a twinge of jealousy for Klopp. “No, no, no,” says Benítez. “Jürgen’s a friend. He’s a nice person, he’s passionate and he’s a great manager. He’s very positive for Liverpool, the club, the city and the fans.”

If few of his former Merseyside public can find anything negative to say about Benítez, certain old players, most notably Steven Gerrard, have described their former boss as a little cold. This week Jerzy Dudek, Liverpool’s one-time goalkeeper, has revived that theme in a new autobiography and Benítez duly addressed the apparent dichotomy between the passion supporters see and the sometimes necessarily detached dressing room persona which has recently resurfaced with his omission of the previously undroppable Jonjo Shelvey and Gini Wijnaldum.

“People say I’m cold,” he says before emphasising he refuses to tell lies and resort to hypocrisy in order to keep people onside. “But I’m professional. I have a responsibility to make decisions.

“ I wouldn’t say I was cold with players, it depends which ones you’re talking about. You have 25, you can’t pick them all. They have to realise I have to decide who plays, who doesn’t. Because of that you have players who are closer to you, maybe others who are not so close. But it’s important I don’t tell lies. If I can’t say anything, I’ll say nothing.”

So far on Tyneside, his man management has been exemplary with certain individuals, most notably Moussa Sissoko and Cheik Tioté, apparently reborn during a hope-restoring win against Swansea and a draw with Manchester City.

“I think there’s a new team spirit now,” says Benítez whose ability to speak, albeit rusty, French to Newcastle’s Francophone contingent is making a big difference. “Before the last two games maybe some players were 50/50 about whether they could stay up but now they are 100% committed that we can do it.”