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He’s been called cocky, arrogant, disrespectful in the past.
But that is only on the surface. Scratch beneath it and you find out that Jose Mourinho is widely revered and highly respected by those who have played under him throughout his very successful career.
Should you follow the path of his career that began in Portugal and is currently revisiting England with stops in Italy and Spain, you would find a clutch of players who reserve only the highest platitudes for the Portuguese tactician, having praised him for bringing out the best in them, forming with him a bond that transcends the standard player-manager relationship, which stems from his understanding that happy people are happy footballers.
A game of join the dots linking those players to clubs where Mourinho was present would show that it is an attitude prevalent in every club where he has taken on the mantle of being a manager.
Ricardo Carvalho is one of his best-known disciples. A member of the UEFA Champions League Team of the Tournament in 2004 for his contributions to Mourinho’s Champions League winning Porto team that year. The former Portugal centre-back then joined his countryman when the ‘Special One’ moved to Stamford Bridge and excelled in a Chelsea team that won the Premier League at the first time of asking.
“For me, what makes him special is that he likes to work on the small details,” said the 35-year-old, who now plays with AS Monaco in France. “He wants you to improve as a player and overall he wants to win. We won a lot of trophies together. Where he improved me as a player was that I needed to be more focused throughout a game.
“Sometimes I lost concentration,” he added. “He got me to focus for the whole game. Even against the smaller teams, he wants you to be focused because he wants to win every game.”
Carvalho formed a successful partnership with John Terry at the heart of Chelsea’s defence, spending six years and winning ten titles. But it was clear that Mourinho thought highly of the centre-back when he needed his services at Real Madrid. Carvalho, then 32, jumped at the chance of rejoining his former mentor and it is quite obvious that the now 35-year-old knows his mentor extremely well.
“When he loses, he can’t live with that. He can’t live with a defeat and you feel that in him,” said Carvalho to Sky Sports. “After a match when you have had a bad game, the next day is a difficult day to work with him. He doesn’t say much but when he speaks, he has to criticise and say what he thinks about your performance. He makes you feel like you have to improve.
“Sometimes he criticises you in front of the other players, at other times he says it to you alone,” adds Carvalho, who has played 75 times for Portugal. “But he is only saying what he thinks, what he sees and what is true for him. He doesn’t say it to blame you, he says it to help you.”
“I never took it personally. You can tell him what you think, too, and he will respect that.”
Despite Carvalho not being a part of Mourinho’s plans during his final season in the Spanish capital, he stayed on at the Santiago Bernabeu instead of moving on loan to a host of other clubs that enquired about his services not just because Mourinho the manager made him the player he was, but because Mourinho made him the person he was.
Although Mourinho only spent a couple of years at Inter Milan, it was clear he had left his mark on those who played for the Nerazzurri. Wesley Sneijder was the heartbeat of the Portuguese tactician’s very successful Inter side and fondly remember’s Mourinho’s years in Italy because he knew when players needed a break from a gruelling, exhausting season.
“Mourinho walks around, talks to the lads, joins in on card games or fooling around,” said the Netherlands international in a lengthy interview he gave after the 2010 FIFA World Cup. “He can look at you and say ‘Wes, you look tired man. Take a couple of days and have some time off with the Missus.’ You know when you come back, he will expect something from you.”
But it wasn’t all fun and games under the Portuguese’s wing, says Sneijder. He knew when to enforce discipline.
“He can be tough too. (Samuel) Eto’o didn’t play sometimes last season,” adds the Dutchman. “He said to the team manager he wanted a meeting with Mourinho. He came back and said ‘Mourinho doesn’t have time for you, Samuel. And if it’s about the line up, he won’t have time for you at all. If you don’t like it here, pack your bag and walk’. And after a while, Eto’o played winger and started to defend and track back.
“Mourinho is a wizard.”
Jose Mourinho (L) and Marco Materazzi shared a special relationship
Eto’o’s time under Mourinho came after Zlatan Ibrahimovic swapped places with the Cameroonian at Barcelona, along with a hefty wad of cash filling the Italian team’s coffers. But the prolific Swede has kind words for his former manager.
“José Mourinho is a big star,” writes Ibrahimovic in his autobiography I am Zlatan. “He had won Champions League already with Porto. He was my coach in Inter. He’s cool. The first time he met (Zlatan’s wife) Helena he whispered to her: ‘Helena, you only have one mission. Feed Zlatan, let him sleep, keep him happy!’ The guy says what he wants. I like him. He’s the leader of an army. But he also cares. He was sending me text messages all the time in Inter asking how I was feeling.”
Mourinho is one of the few coaches Zlatan Ibrahimovic truly respects. ‘Ibra’ has always been a player who, in his own words, has run his own race. He argued with Pep Guardiola at Barcelona, challenged the great Louis van Gaal at Ajax and has always had a fractious relationship with the world’s media.
But he remembers Mourinho because he was invested in Zlatan the human being, not just Zlatan the footballer and understood what made him happy.
There are, of course, others - Frank Lampard and Didier Drogba - two icons of Chelsea’s recent successes who shined under the Special One during his first spell in West London always have fond words for him when speaking to press.
Chelsea legend Lampard was close to leaving the club after his contract expired this summer, but it was Mourinho who asked him to sign on after he’d been confirmed as Chelsea boss. It is due to Mourinho, says the midfielder, that the entire team is raring to go.
“We are very aware of how he is and, if there is a spring in my step, it’s because it is like having a new teacher at school,” says the 35-year-old. “It can only be a good thing when you have 22 players all wanting to play. We have had that all pre-season.
“There has been a real lift around the place. The young players have reacted to the manager,” finishes Lampard, one of only four players present at Stamford Bridge at the time of Mourinho’s second coming.
That Mourinho wrote the foreword in Drogba’s autobiography shows how close the relationship is between player and manager. Drogba remains forever thankful to the Portuguese because he made him the world-beater he is today. Speaking to Sports Illustrated, the Drog said:
“He brought me to Chelsea. I improved and grew up with Chelsea, becoming the player everyone knows now. I hope everyone respects now that this is for me a team that I cannot forget. I will always be linked to Chelsea. For me, it is normal. You can’t take away from my heart what I did with this club and all the people I played with.”
That link to Chelsea could soon be one that expands from a role larger than just that of former player. Mourinho is keen on securing the forward’s services in a coaching capacity which would see him return to Fulham Road.
These are but a handful of players who Mourinho has had a hand in developing and whether tangible or not, every player who has played under him and trained alongside him will feel the his imprint. Just ask <Marco Matterazzi; the Italian broke down when Mourinho was leaving Inter Milan, and if he can make a veritable enforcer such as the man who will be remembered for his head-butt on Zinedine Zidane at the World Cup Final shed tears, it is clear that he has touched the lives of those who are fortunate enough to work with him.
Mourinho will be remembered for many things. The press will remember him as one who always entertains. Opposing managers will remember him for his will to win. Head honchos at clubs will remember him for the manner in which he was at loggerheads with them.
But to the players who are what they are today because of him, he will always be the Special One.
