Could Mourinho Be ‘Special’ At Inter?
It would seem almost certain that former Chelsea boss Jose Mourinho is ready to throw himself back into the lion’s den of football management. Mourinho, who has been out of work since he left Chelsea in a blaze of publicity 8 months ago, looks like he’s going to try Serie A for size following Mancini’s departure. Whether he’ll be as adored there as he was at Chelsea remains to be seen – the Italians can be a pretty unforgiving lot in defeat. I’m sure that even after their domestic success, it feels a little hollow in the circumstances and the lack of success in Europe compared to AC Milan really grates for Inter – they won’t tolerate further ‘failure’. On the flip side to that though, if he can manage to do what he couldn’t quite achieve at Chelsea, the Nerazzurri will make him feel very ‘special’.
Strangely enough, Mourinho seems to be playing down his ‘Special One’ tag a bit ahead of his new post – well, sort of. As only Jose can, he humbly says he isn’t worthy of being called ‘special’, but only because he regards himself as “a great football manager” instead. Now I’m not even going to argue that his record as a good manager speaks for itself – Champions League victory with Porto, followed by six trophies in three years with us – but how ‘great’ he really is, is yet to be determined.
When you think of ‘great’ managers, it’s names like Sir Matt Busby and Sir Alex Ferguson that spring to mind – the clue being in the title maybe? But whilst Mourinho has proved, without question, that he’s a great tactician and motivator, he’s yet to prove there’s more to his management than his own ambition.
I’m not aiming for a complete character assassination of Mourinho here, because there’s still plenty I like about him, but having had 8 months to sit back and look at where things went wrong at Chelsea and reading his slightly bitter comments in the wake of our Champions League defeat, it’s just interesting to hear what he’s got to say for himself as he heads for the San Siro.
Whether or not he’s ready to drop the ‘special one’ label isn’t all that clear because he says its not necessarily a bad thing – and I personally think he prefers to believe his own hype. Statements like “I only have strengths. And when I have a weakness I try to hide it”, have Jose written all over them but does he hide his weaknesses as well as he thinks he does? Because although he says “I see myself as a person who is emotionally resilient”, I think this is one area where TSO falls down in the management game (transfer market aside).
Mourinho’s personal ambition is so great it’s not clear whether he loves the beautiful game as much as he does himself. Rather than a desire to win, his style of football reflects his determination not to lose and his verbal spats with officials and opposition are driven by his ego. Before every Champions League game with Liverpool, for example, his fear of being beaten saw much mud slung in Rafa’s direction, only to end up in the mire himself each time. Fortunately for us, Rafa adopted the Mourinho-style big game preparations this season and his personal crusade against Drogba paid dividends – for us.
So, having battled with the self importance of their previous manager and seen him out the door, it’ll be interesting to see how the ego’s at Inter warm to TSO. He’s already pre-warned them by saying “As a manager I’m a very easy person. It’s very easy to work with me because it’s clear and neat – players must be open and ready to follow me” - very pied piper. Let’s just hope Lampard and Carvalho aren’t ready to dance to his tune again!
Filed under: Rants
As a Chelsea fan subjected, as we all are, to the endless barrage of lies, half lies , character assassination and so that has been directed at the club since roman took over, it pains me when Chelsea fans swallow it whole. I’m afraid that included some of the writers on this and other Chelsea fan web site.
Consistent enough to be called a campaign the nastiness directed at the blues started long before Jose and has gone on ever since, in fact it occurs every time we look like winning something or upsetting the hierarchy of English football.
A lot of these attacks rely on certain statements which are repeated over and over till everyone thinks they’re must be true. Sometimes for their own reasons CFC management do it too - lets list a few
1 chels were playing awful football when Jose was sacked - they weren’t playing any worse than Man U who also lost a lot of games at the beginning of the season. That fool grant runs this one up the flagpole as well but its nonsense. We draw nil nil in the first game of the Cl groups stages what’s that mean? We got to the final didn’t we?
The truth is that Jose’s last nine months were blighted by back room nastiness and undermining, a embargo on buying any players and a horrible run of injuries ( how many times in 2007 did drogba/terry/ lampard and Cech play together, not that often. It didn’t have a lot to do with Jose and the fact the team were still in contention at the end of last season and is down to him and the character he put into the team and the great buys he made.
Its true his record of purchases wasn’t 100% successful, but who’s ever is - buying is the hardest thing for a manager and a lot of it is luck- Ferguson made as many dodgy buys as Jose, so does everyone, Rafa anyone.
There’s no evidence he believed his own hype - the players loved him and played for him and that’s all you want from a manager - nor is there any evidence he put himself before the players. I never saw it. Quite the opposite actually.
The press also like to claim we played fantastic football in his first 2 seasons and then somehow it evaporated. That’s not what the press said when we were doing it believe me and the reason for the third year change is not hard to find – look at the different team sheets and the injury list for a start
Please there’s enough bullshit thrown at Chelsea by the press as it is, without our own fans buying into it.
Of course the press loved it when he went, and loved Grant ( and his privately paid for PR campaign) but that’s because we were fucking losers - they hated Mourinho because he was a winner who broke the hierarchy of who were big clubs and who wasn’t - does anyone seriously think we’re in a better place now since he’s gone - Roman was doing great when he hired him and kenyon and he’s gone off the rails somewhat ever since he sacked him. Especially since its clear that Roman’s ego was the problem not Jose’s.
Nor did I think Mourinho’s comments after the CL final were churlish I thought they were very sympathetic.
The strange thing is that the only current candidate who ticks every box that Chelsea want in a manager is still only Jose. Something, which tells its own story.