The Mourinho Thread

[Johnny Kills 164]

I'm gonna be honest - I love that we're "ganging up" on Mourinho right now as opposed to just believing in him. His decision to leave out RLC for 82 minutes was laughable at best. His statement of putting out the best team vs Derby is the same. A match vs a championship team - surely we could afford to play just 1 youth surrounded by 10 first teamers, right?

However, that brilliant article by Neville put things into perspective to me. At the absolute worst, we have a top 3 academy in England. It took a while for the club to get to this point. If you look at Mourinho's record, he doesn't integrate youth into his squad. Please don't feed me the BS of "look at how many players he gave their debuts too" because that's EXACTLY the same thing that just happened to RLC. A debut without consistent playing time means fuck all.

Back to my point - this is a new strategy for Mourinho as well. He's also coming to terms with this outlook for the first time in his 14 year career. Neville was talking about how linked the youth team and the first team was, how everything's integrated, he was learning from his experiences etc. Well couldn't you say this was RLC's first major learning experience? Whether the match meant anything or not, players uproot their families just so they can play for a club in the CL. He also had his first presser alongside his manager possibly for the next 10 years. Mourinho's mindset is win at all costs - we know this and love it. It's going to take some trial and error on his part on how to go about it. It's easy for us to sit here and say "ah well he should play player A here for X minutes and player B for X minutes" but it's our league to lose this year and IMO Jose knows that.

[lionsden 4,689]

Absolutely. Action speaks volumes. Mourinho can say youth integration in any number of different ways he wants but ultimately, I'd rather see the youth players given a chance on the pitch rather than be talked about in the press.

League cup game at Derby tomorrow and Mourinho has belted out "We will pick a strong side" etc.

And that's after saying this just a couple of days ago

http://www.express.co.uk/sport/football/545537/Chelsea-Jose-Mourinho-rest-players-December-football-news

But then again his idea of strong side could just mean the squad players. I don't think anyone can defend him if he starts our key players in this match.

[Jase 43,479]

When the journalists asked Mourinho about his record of promoting players from the academy (can't remember the exact question but it was something along those lines), he defended himself by mentioning Carlos Alberto at Porto, Santon at Inter Milan and Varane at Real Madrid, the three players he brought in from the academy. The funny thing about that was, only Santon was from the youth system while Carlos Alberto and Varane were bought from Fluminese and Lens respectively.

Buying young players and integrating them into the first team can't exactly be considered as 'promoting from the youth academy', can it? Out of the many young players from the academy he gave debut to, Santon was probably only one of the very few who continued to be in the first team after his first senior game. The rest, arguably, were pushed aside and never to be seen much again. If only the journalists had been braver and followed up on that Mourinho response by asking something like this "but those are only three notable players you promoted from the youth academy, what about the rest?".

[pHaRaOn 2,131]

All this Boga "thing" just journalists mishear. Jose never mention Boga. He named Oscar, not Boga.

[lionsden 4,689]

When the journalists asked Mourinho about his record of promoting players from the academy (can't remember the exact question but it was something along those lines), he defended himself by mentioning Carlos Alberto at Porto, Santon at Inter Milan and Varane at Real Madrid, the three players he brought in from the academy. The funny thing about that was, only Santon was from the youth system while Carlos Alberto and Varane were bought from Fluminese and Lens respectively.

Buying young players and integrating them into the first team can't exactly be considered as 'promoting from the youth academy', can it? Out of the many young players from the academy he gave debut to, Santon was probably only one of the very few who continued to be in the first team after his first senior game. The rest, arguably, were pushed aside and never to be seen much again. If only the journalists had been braver and followed up on that Mourinho response by asking something like this "but those are only three notable players you promoted from the youth academy, what about the rest?".

You think the poor journalists want to spend the next 2 hours listening to lectures about lemons, egg, chicken, yolk and little horses?.

[Shane 2,275]

When the journalists asked Mourinho about his record of promoting players from the academy (can't remember the exact question but it was something along those lines), he defended himself by mentioning Carlos Alberto at Porto, Santon at Inter Milan and Varane at Real Madrid, the three players he brought in from the academy. The funny thing about that was, only Santon was from the youth system while Carlos Alberto and Varane were bought from Fluminese and Lens respectively.

Buying young players and integrating them into the first team can't exactly be considered as 'promoting from the youth academy', can it? Out of the many young players from the academy he gave debut to, Santon was probably only one of the very few who continued to be in the first team after his first senior game. The rest, arguably, were pushed aside and never to be seen much again. If only the journalists had been braver and followed up on that Mourinho response by asking something like this "but those are only three notable players you promoted from the youth academy, what about the rest?".

Jose didn't really do it at Inter and Madrid because he wasn't there long enough and the short term results were too important. Especially at Madrid. Its all well and good talking about it in theory, but a top manager isn't going to risk bringing youth players through because they're under pressure for short term results. If a manager starts to intergrate youth players results could slip and in today's footballing world a few bad results and questions are being immediately asked of your job.

This can change with managerial stability. Jose knew he wasn't going to spend long with Inter or Madrid, but obviously see's Chelsea as a long term thing, So promoting youth players is something we'll see more of in the future. We have to give Jose the chance to perfect the first team side before the promoting of youth players becomes a main priority.

[Madmax 9,219]

Jose didn't really do it at Inter and Madrid because he wasn't there long enough and the short term results were too important. Especially at Madrid. Its all well and good talking about it in theory, but a top manager isn't going to risk bringing youth players through because they're under pressure for short term results. If a manager starts to intergrate youth players results could slip and in today's footballing world a few bad results and questions are being immediately asked of your job.

This can change with managerial stability. Jose knew he wasn't going to spend long with Inter or Madrid, but obviously see's Chelsea as a long term thing, So promoting youth players is something we'll see more of in the future. We have to give Jose the chance to perfect the first team side before the promoting of youth players becomes a main priority.

Everyone gets all that and nobody's asking him to start Baker or Boga in place of Willian; nobody's asking for Christensen and Ake to start against Man City. What is puzzling is when he doesn't play anyone from Brown, Baker, Boga or Solanke 48 hours after OT at Shrewsbury, when he sings paeans about RLC only to give him 8 minutes in a dead rubber. That's not down to managerial stability, that's down to managerial will.

[Jase 43,479]

You think the poor journalists want to spend the next 2 hours listening to lectures about lemons, egg, chicken, yolk and little horses?.

Then those lots aren't doing their job properly. Even if Mourinho starts to talk trash if they ask him the question, will be interesting to hear his answer still, given he spoke so proudly about promoting youth, calling it 'Academy Day' etc like he's giving birth or something.

[didierforever 7,349]

WOW!!

[Shane 2,275]

Everyone gets all that and nobody's asking him to start Baker or Boga in place of Willian; nobody's asking for Christensen and Ake to start against Man City. What is puzzling is when he doesn't play anyone from Brown, Baker, Boga or Solanke 48 hours after OT at Shrewsbury, when he sings paeans about RLC only to give him 8 minutes in a dead rubber. That's not down to managerial stability, that's down to managerial will.

Because if we fielded a team with Baker, Boga and Solanke in it, along with Christensen, Ake, Salah and Zouma in it we'd probably lose and I imagine Jose really wants to win the Capital One Cup this season. I would have started Solanke over Drogba but Drogba needed match fitness which is paying dividends now.

RLC probably should have got more game time yes, But Jose wanted to make sure the game was won. We owed it to Schalke to play our best and put out a good side. Nearly every team who had qualified put out more or less there strongest teams.

If we want to give our academy players more time then they need to be in the squad instead of the likes of Salah, Mikel, Ramires because when we have a chance to weaken the team these players will be given the minutes first because of their fees and wages.

And it is down to managerial stability. If Jose had been here 4 or 5 years we would have seen more academy players. The young players will learn what Jose expects him to do in his position and will be ready once called up. They will know their jobs inside out and will have seen the senior squad winning on the pitch with the same work ethic and style of play.

Would people really rather us become an Arsenal? Give everyone a run out in the Capital One Cup but win fuck all every year?

[iseah100 5,612]

You think the poor journalists want to spend the next 2 hours listening to lectures about lemons, egg, chicken, yolk and little horses?.

Melons....

[CHOULO19 24,332]

He actually name dropped Boga in the discussion lmao. If he wasn't a football manager, he would have made a good politician because he does talk an awful lot of bollocks.

Honestly, I just read it now and actually burst out laughing.

Actually, he did not. He said Oscar and it somehow ended up being misquoted as Boga.

[CHOULO19 24,332]

The randomness of it just screams PR stunt like you said. Boga just rolled off his tongue out of Nowhere. The interviewer must have been thinking where did that come from Jose.

[LDN Blue 7,903]

Because if we fielded a team with Baker, Boga and Solanke in it, along with Christensen, Ake, Salah and Zouma in it we'd probably lose and I imagine Jose really wants to win the Capital One Cup this season. I would have started Solanke over Drogba but Drogba needed match fitness which is paying dividends now.

RLC probably should have got more game time yes, But Jose wanted to make sure the game was won.

But he didn't say Baker, Boga and Solanke.. He said 'or'. Let's not make excuses for the sake of it, one of those guys could have featured. It's Shrewsbury ffs. If Van Gaal has enough faith to use Wilson v Liverpool surely its not that hard to use one of those 3 v Shrewsbury?!

And I'm sorry but the Sporting (I assume you meant) thing is a cop out. That game was won as soon as it was 2-0. In a dead rubber, even 2-1 is safe. Roberto Martinez played a very youthful side in his last EL game and they lost, but he said it was invaluable for those kids to learn from that.

Is it really so bad if we lose a dead rubber for the sake of making these academy boys into men? Can't cotton wool them forever, remember a certain Alan Hansen saying 'You can't win it with kids' about a certain class of '99?

[lionsden 4,689]

Actually, he did not. He said Oscar and it somehow ended up being misquoted as Boga.

Link ?

[CHOULO19 24,332]

But he didn't say Baker, Boga and Solanke.. He said 'or'. Let's not make excuses for the sake of it, one of those guys could have featured. It's Shrewsbury ffs. If Van Gaal has enough faith to use Wilson v Liverpool surely its not that hard to use one of those 3 v Shrewsbury?!

We had Ake, Christensen and Zouma start against Shrewsbury not to mention a few fringe players that desperately needed match fitness, and considering that we barely won that match 2-1 I'd say that Jose got the balance exactly right.

And for the record, it's Strawberry*!

[CHOULO19 24,332]

Link ?

http://www.getwestlondon.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/chelsea-boss-reveals-frank-lampard-8287448?utm_source=Get+West+London&utm_medium=twitter

[RoyalBlues 4,050]

How come Jose always get what he is wishing for?