The Mourinho Thread

[dave30 728]

@wehatescouse - Has your mate at the training ground got any inside info on who's the replacement. He's been a diamond for me previously?

[MefiX19 1,092]

It is not a poor narrative, it is a stupid and deluded narrative. This is even more a stupid narrative than it could be because the same people seems to associate this narrative (i.e. 'player power') with the narrative of 'players being no leaders, being spineless, being pussies'.

This association of narratives is extremely incoherent and stinks 'desilusion' and 'bad faith'. How can a pussy on the pitch suddenly turns out to be a grade-A lobbyist as soon as they enter the dressing room ? They simply don't. Drogba, Lampard, Essien, Cole, Terry they were the definition of 'player power' (ask Scolari and AVB). Though they were also 'leaders' and had 'passion'. That's just like with Ramos and Casillas : they were the 'player power' at Madrid, but they were also 'leaders' and were 'Madrid'.

So once again I ask the question, how can our spineless bunch of players can have any sort of power ? And we are not talking about having a 'little' power, we are talking about having a 'lot' of power. Because it concerns Mourinho for Christ's sake. Even an icon such as Casillas has had his career ruined in the process of getting Mourinho out. And if we analyze our previous 'player power', we can realize that it took Lampard, Cole and Essien to fire a mere nobody such as André Villas-Boas. The problem here is that, none of our player have the status that Lampard/Essien/Cole had (and I am not sure that any of them, except maybe Hazard will reach this status) ; and in term of status, Villas-Boas is a nobody compared to Mourinho.

I really find it difficult to believe that our squad has enough power to get Mourinho sacked. Not only that, I also believe that a lot of them are simply not clever enough to do that... I mean, could you picture Ramires scheming a plan to get Mourinho axed ? Really ? And he's not the only one in this case. Moreover, a lot of players own too much to Mourinho to act against him. With Benitez, Terry was out of the picture and that's Mourinho who reinstated him as the undroppable leader. Ivanovic has been made vice-captain and has a free-pass with most managers he would have been associated with Terry on the bench. Mikel, he collects checks because of Mourinho. Ramires can still miss passes in a Chelsea shirt because of Mourinho. Zouma, that is Mourinho who introduced him in the team. Oscar, he can go on to hide himself on football pitches because Mourinho saw him as his n°10. I could go on and on.

As you and many others have already described, when you see our players play, you can see no difference in 'passion' between last year when we were Champions and this year when we are 'zero'. They run just as much, they tackle just as much, they give effort just as much. No, on the contrary, what one could witness, it is a good-willed bunch of players that are lost. They want to success, but nobody tells them how to do and unfortunately 'pass the ball to Hazard' is not working any longer. They are also lost because that is a situation extremely difficult to handle for newly crowned champions and throwing them under the bus is definitely not the solution.

And finally, when we talk about 'Mourinho having lost the dressing-room', this is not about a bunch of rebels that strike 'Mourinho out'. It only means that the dressing-room not longer responded to him because his methods and 'pedagogy' no longer worked on them. Simply enough. So yeah, if you want to create a football version of 'Game of thrones', the 'player power' is the narrative you should use but unfortunately for us, most often than not, reality is really un-exciting.

I love you and your posts.

[ZOS 580]

:(

KTBFFH

[Fernando 6,375]

To be fair all this feels like a reset for me.

We can start afresh and focus on what we really want.

If you think this is bad, then how do you think Juventus felt when they got relegated?

But their board did great work and found a young manager to bring them back to relevance.

I think in time we can get back to that feel good attitude we once had buy these coming months are going to be tough.

If the board do a good business between now and summer it might help lighten the pain.

We should learn from Juventus in times like this.

[Ossie the King 634]

We should learn from Juventus in times like this.

Pay off refs?

[Rmpr 8,977]

Well, big kuddos to Jose. Made a lot of people in here eat their words in regards to his sack fee...

[Yeboii 1,844]

Saw a few pictures. All the players I saw looked pretty sad but Terry looks VERY sad there.

Hard to imagine which players were actually against him, if there were any.

[Vybz Kartel 1,613]

Worst decision I have ever made in my life is following this drama filled club, can we just have a 4 season if not being top news for the wrong reasons?

[Fernando 6,375]

Pay off refs?

Post scandalous Juventus.

[JaKstone 307]

Jose Mourinho leaves Cobham, reported he was crying when he left.

I can't help but almost cry for this situation but sadly it was the only way. If we lose Hazard, Matic, Costa, etc in the summer we will end up worse than Tottenham. We would need to replace them with Reus, Gundogan, Lacazette, etc and I don't know why any of them would want to come here when there is no UCL.

'There is speculation that Chelsea have approached Pep Guardiola about taking over at the end of Hiddink’s temporary stint. The Daily Mail say the Spaniard has let the club know that he thinks they need 10 new players to get to where they want to be.' via the Guardian.

No shit, 10 players. The board should talk to Guardiola to try and get some this january and the rest in the summer.

[Laylabelle 9,292]

Knew was coming but still :-( just weren't meant to be and hope he does well wherever he goes even if United

Players now have no excuse and need to get a grip and step up and do what they're paid for!

Thanks for the memories.less so with this. Season lol

[zolayes 14,489]

I know some people want to forget the 80s but unfortunately they happened. We were hated (mostly because we had a lot of really not nice people at the Bridge) and Rick Astley was a real thing.

Now if you get to the 90s when Hoddle takes over, everything changes. But let's not pretend we went from Osgood, Cooke and Bonetti to Gullit, Vialli and Zola without some stuff in between.

we were hated because of some of our fans but not universally despised because of our manager

[JaKstone 307]

Knew was coming but still :-( just weren't meant to be and hope he does well wherever he goes even if United

Players now have no excuse and need to get a grip and step up and do what they're paid for!

Thanks for the memories.less so with this. Season lol

I only hope we play more attacking football now and give the anti football tactics a rest.

[robsblubot 3,205]

Players don't need a spine not to play or not to give 100%.

Even more subtle: they may give 100% in matches but not in practice or during the breaks, so when it's time to actually give their 100%, they just can't.

I think people are mixing things up a bit. Players may have their own agenda and backstab without need to have a strong character.

BTW, Simeone would be Jose 2.0: same style just younger and more energy. Perhaps the right manager for this squad, but hardly the best long-term as we will be playing with a low block for the foreseeable future.

[Laylabelle 9,292]

Guess his waxwork at Tussards be gone..

[didierforever 7,349]

to all the genuises on here, please enlighten us poor souls as to what changed so drastically that jose got fired NOW.

league title - gone

top 4 - gone

2 weeks to january transfer window. who better to have the perfect insights to exactly what changes had to be made than JOSE FUCKING MOURINHO.

there were better oppurtunities to sack him. times where the PL was not out of reach and definitely the top 4 was not out of reach.

tell me exactly, how the board of a billion dollar company sacks a manager 2 weeks before the transfer window, with no hope of acheiving any thing much at this point even with the sacking. and that too 1 day before a game.

so after all the shit, today all teh board members got up and suddenly had a change of heart and thought of sacking jose after just 2 months of giving a written statement of the club being behind jose. give a good enough reason for the sacking at this point of time, because honestly of all the times we could have sacked, this has got to be the worst.

it gives the new manager no time at all to really understand the squad so that he can ask for players. it gives the new manager with no time to do anything with the squad since this is going to be the busiest period with games coming thick and fast, so even the training would be lesser.

it has the smack of player power all over it. and anyone who cant see it is just naive.

[Ossie the King 634]

we were hated because of some of our fans but not universally despised because of our manager

Bear in mind that it helped that we were shit in the 80s.

When Jose took over we were despised because of the money and no-one would let us forget it, so he showed us how to wear it like a badge of honour. Fuck em all, as the song goes.

The thing I keep coming back to after all this is, 'who are we?'. Maybe not the day for big existential questions but Jose could've built something long-lasting here. We'll never know though and for me a big part of that is the lack of backing he got in the summer.

[Clockwork 1,762]

So we fit the manager to the players?

The person above Jose is Roman, despite us having a board. In fact the only person who has come close to challenging what he wants from the team is Jose.

Look at United, they were defined by Matt Busby and Alex Ferguson. Arsenal were defined by Wenger. Barcelona are defined not by a president who is elected, but by an overarching philosophy that is based in La Masia.

What are we defined by? What is our identity? 20 years ago (and in the 1970s too) we were this fashionable, stylish team that people actually liked watching. We were also flimsy and couldn't last 38 games, so were essentially a very good cup team and a good bet to finish top 6.

Now we are whatever Roman wants us to be, except he doesn't really know either.

Going back to La Masia though, if people want us to find an identity in the youth team then they're very much built in the mould of Jose. At least when City decided they wanted to be the English Barcelona they went all in and even found time to back Pellegrini.

I have no fucking idea what Chelsea wants to be. That is the most worrying thing of all.

Short term yes, we need a manager who fits the players. Beyond this season the manager should bring players that fits what he wants.

I don't know how the club operates at that level, i hope Roman has a counsel who makes the decision or something.

We need someone like Hans- Joachim Watzke, Dortmund visionary CEO and great football mind. He got Dortmund out of bankruptcy, created a great scouting infrastructure, hired Klopp, then when he left he hired Tuchel to continue Dortmund success.

Busby or SAF type managers are quite difficult in modern football, Barca foundation started when Cruyff arrived more then 30 years ago. That feat is also quite difficult.

Yeah i agree about the pessimism toward our board.