Rafa Benitez and Sam Allardyce lock horns once again when Newcastle host Everton... it will rekindle one of the most bitter managerial feuds in Premier League history

• e-mail

When Everton rock up at St James' Park to face Newcastle on Wednesday night, all eyes will be focused on the opposing dugouts.

There will be a conciliatory handshake between the two managers, a brief recognition, and then they will part to take their place on their respective benches.

For Rafa Benitez and Sam Allardyce it will be business as usual, a desperation to get the three points and boost their survival chances.

Rafa Benitez and Sam Allardyce went head-to-head for the first time in August 2004

But they'd be forgiven for letting a personal agenda get in the way of the collective need for a win. It will be the 14th time they have gone head-to-head, and the sixth different fixture they have overseen.

Ever since Kevin Davies broke Sami Hyypia's nose and scored the winning goal in Bolton's 1-0 win over Liverpool in August 2004, the pair simply have not seen eye-to-eye.

It's hardly surprising, you could hardly find two more diverse characters across the Premier League.

Allardyce, born and raised in the midlands, widely caricatured as a simple long-ball merchant. And then Benitez, born in the Spanish capital Madrid and with a professorial look, viewed as an intellectual of the coaching world.

The two adversaries have met 13 times in five different fixtures in the Premier League era

Benitez disliked Bolton's long-ball approach under Allardyce in their first meeting

And yet they are more similar than they appear, or you suspect, they'd like to admit. Both are impressive defensive organisers and take a modern approach to their methods.

Allardyce has always taken great influence from American sports, his coaching style is statistically driven and he is a keen proponent of sports science.

Benitez too is famed for his defensive organising, with a particular emphasis - certainly in this country - on his use of squad rotation and zonal marking. Both are stubborn, principled and rightly proud of their respective achievements.

Allardyce may well have said this week that 'our previous history is okay... life's too short for grudges', but there's no doubt Benitez got under his skin unlike any managerial import in Premier League history.

The Spaniard has won seven of their 13 meetings losing only three times in the process

The nature of the first meeting 13 years ago, when Benitez complained afterwards that 'all the game the ball in the area was in the air', set up a clash of footballing philosophies that has endured.

It was his first league defeat as Liverpool manager, giving him a first taste of the differences between football in England from Spain.

It was a lesson he quickly adapted to from his second season onwards. 

Five years later, the philosophical differences moved over into the personal. Now Blackburn manager, Allardyce laid into the Spaniard: 'He can't help it but whinge and moan can he? He loves it, doesn't he? 

'It is great a manager moaning about the way I play, irrespective of what they think of me as a manager.'

Liverpool promptly won 4-0 at Anfield, and Benitez further irked Allardyce when he appeared to signal 'game over' after Fernando Torres doubled the score.

Liverpool defeated Newcastle 3-0 at St James' Park under Allardyce back in November 2007

The relationship got personal when Allardyce took offence at gestures by Benitez in 2009

'I think if everybody has a look back at his gestures you will see them as pretty dismissive to me and the Blackburn ­Rovers team as a whole,' said Allardyce. 

'I was hugely disappointed by those gestures. I think they were disrespectful and quite humiliating.'

Sir Alex Ferguson jumped on the bandwagon, calling Benitez 'arrogant' and 'showing contempt' and claiming his actions were 'beyond the pale'

The then-Liverpool boss later explained: 'I was saying, "Alonso, play short" but Alonso crossed and Torres scored. So I was saying, "OK, good". Simple.' 

In February 2010 Benitez reopened the war of words, sarcastically comparing Allardyce's Blackburn side to Barcelona: 'I think it is a model for all the managers around the world, their style of football, his behaviour.

Benitez sarcastically compared Allardyce's Blackburn to Pep Guardiola's Barcelona in 2010

'The style of football, I think, Barcelona are thinking of copying.'

Their last public spat came just over two years ago, when Allardyce wrote in his autobiography that Benitez had 'nowt to do' with Liverpool's Champions League win in 2005.

Benitez responded in kind by pointing to Allardyce's bare trophy cabinet: 'Allardyce is what happens when you get a book in England… his opinion has little value. How many titles has Allardyce won? That tells you all.'

Allardyce may have had a little chuckle to himself when Sunderland survived relegation in 2016 and sent Newcastle down to the Championship in the process, but there was no public playout this time.

The Spaniard certainly holds the upper hand in their meetings, winning seven of the 13 and losing only three times. 

But if Allardyce continues his unbeaten start at Everton - a side Benitez labelled 'a small team' when Liverpool manager - and stretch Newcastle's winless run further, will the man from Dudley be able to stop himself?

Allardyce inflicted a first defeat on Benitez as Chelsea boss with a 3-1 win in December 2012

The pair last met when Sunderland held rivals Newcastle to a 1-1 draw in March 2016