In the current line-up only the goalkeeping coach, Christophe Lollichon, can be relied on to erupt, as he did on half an hour when Cole was bowled over en route to goal. Benítez also went potty, but it was only a brief deviation from a generally more passive approach. Bolo Zenden, one of his few backroom appointments, lacks the coaching qualifications to join him on the front row of the bench.
By nature Benítez is all authoritarian detachment, dragging motions and barks, though here against Nordsjaelland his shouting was more tentative than we remember from his Anfield days. In his first three games he seemed intent on a kind of diplomatic scorched earth, letting slip that Frank Lampard and Cole would be leaving in the summer, and jabbing his finger at his team, against Manchester City and Fulham.
The hostility that shook this ground on the day he took over from Di Matteo has faded into listlessness. Benítez was jeered again but without last week's volume. Booing Abramovich's latest appointee artist is already a Stamford Bridge ritual, like buying a programme or trying to catch the TV camera's eye with a banner demanding Jose the return of Mourinho back or sticking up for Di Matteo.
It was hardly a shock to see the former Valencia, Liverpool and Inter Milan coach a bit subdued, even with a 6-1 lead. His fate was settled in another oligarch's palace, in Donetsk, where Shakhtar fell a goal behind to Juventus to hush the Chelsea crowd even more.
Instinct says there was more to Benítez's mood than geographical impotence. However tough he is, he could hardly block out a fortnight of hostility, derision and relentless media questioning. Beyond those external challenges, he will have picked up the sense that all he is meant to do is keep things ticking over until someone more glamorous comes in, not rewrite the job descriptions of Juan Mata or the excellent Eden Hazard, who made a succession of penetrating bursts, without quite offering convincing evidence of his ability to cross with his left-foot.
Ordinarily Benítez would be jotting War and Peace in his notebook. He would record every nuance, every training ground requirement. But he might as well write his grocery list. He must see by now that winning over this dressing room while simultaneously persuading Abramovich to drop his pursuit of bigger names is a quest not even the heroes of Greek mythology would attempt.
A softly-softly approach is his best hope. Even without John Terry and Lampard, this Chelsea side will not be bullied. They are in the habit of outliving managers: especially ones reviled by the crowd. Coercion, from Benítez's perspective, is hopeless. All he can hope to do is persuade these players that he knows what they need; knows not to complicate and obstruct their efforts.
"They are adjusting to our ideas, everything we are trying to achieve," he claimed.
To instil fear is way outside his range, but he may yet make it as far as respect. Then again his world already churns with references to The Damned United and Brian Clough's disastrous 44-day reign at Leeds. That was a doomed marriage. This is no more than an extended date.
Benítez's religion has been control: a good one for a manager. But he is in the wrong church for that, so he might as well relax and help the players do what they were doing before he arrived, with a tightening up at the back.
Anything else is futile, as his demeanour seemed to acknowledge.
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