Last season you won the FA Cup and the Carling Cup, but missed out in the
Premiership and Champions League. Was it frustrating for you?
“At the end of the season I was very happy with my contribution to my team and
to my club and I think the frustrated people were only the injured players
who could not give us more.
“It must be frustrating for guys like Joe Cole and Arjen Robben who are
injured half of the season, and it must be more than a frustration - because
the guy is mad about playing football - for JT [John Terry] to be out for
three or four months. He must be close to suicide because he was mad about
not playing football.
“It must be frustrating for them to see game after game that they cannot help.
December and January were a nightmare. After that we survived and we kept in
competition and we got to April when all the decisions are coming and again,
bang, injuries destroy everything. So [Roberto] Carvalho is out, [Michael]
Essien is out, Robben is out, so it was again a nightmare.
“We were so close with Champions League, there was a moment in the Premiership
where we were also smelling the first position, and after that again,
injured, injured, injured, and we couldn’t do it. But no frustration.” Did
Manchester United strike two blows last season in that they took your title
and also played some wonderful attacking football?
“I disagree. I disagree and I feel the reason why we won the FA Cup final is
because we understand better than anybody else the way they play.
“For me they counter-attack with beautiful football, absolutely beautiful
football. I think you use the word astonishing. When they win the ball in
defensive positions and the opponent does not have a good tactical balance,
it’s ‘Goodbye, see you later’, then the ball is in the centre circle for the
restart [after a goal].
“So you must understand the way they play and you must adapt to their way of
play. The Cup final was a game when Chelsea were in trouble with so many
injuries, but Chelsea were comfortable in the game because we understand the
way they play. So I disagree a little bit.” But people say it was a boring
game and Chelsea are a boring team - ruthlessly efficient and tactically
brilliant, but not entertaining. Do you feel a responsibility to entertain?
You have the players.
“If somebody tells me in our first season [Mourinho arrived at the beginning
of the 2004-05 season], when we played the whole season with Robben and
[Damien] Duff, if somebody tells me we were a boring team, I have to
disagree completely. In the first season we were champions easily and played
fantastic football, a little bit in this Man United concept, especially in
transitions, absolutely unstoppable. We had matches where we scored so many
goals in the first minutes.
“The second season, in my opinion, was also good - not so good, but good. The
third season was a season of problems, was a season where we had to play
almost all the time in a very closed 4-4-2 because we had only midfield
players. So when we have only midfield players we have to close the game, we
had to play with a diamond.
“A big team is the kind of team that opponents play closed against, so if the
opponent is closed, is afraid of the big team, and the big team has no
opportunities to play open and wide and fast, the game becomes closed.
“I agree completely that our football last season was a football of survival,
that was a word I used a lot. ‘We need to survive, we need to win this game
to keep in the title race, we need to draw this game to progress in Champions
League’. That was the kind of game we played.
“So if you ask me do we want to win the title back? Yes, we want to. And if
you ask me, do we want to improve our game? Yes, we want to.”
So you want to go back to wingers, to go back on the front foot again?
“We will work our 4-3-3 with wingers, of course, and we will change our 4-4-2
with a diamond to a 4-4-2 with wingers. So the objective of having Robben
and [Florent] Malouda and Joe [Cole] and [Solomon] Kalou and so on is
because we want to have always these solutions to give width to our game, to
give depth, to give speed, to give creativity. We want to do that.” You will
play with a flat midfield four? You’ve never done that before.
“Not in Chelsea but there is the possibility of playing with two strikers and
one of them being the man to play in between the lines. Didier [Drogba] is
not the man for that, Didier is a striker man. Kalou is not the man, he’s a
pure striker too. But [Claudio] Pizarro and Sheva [Andriy Shevchenko] are
very intelligent players in the way they move behind and they can be the man
to come from behind, so in this moment we have solutions for these two
systems. I hope not to play with the diamond unless I need to do it for some
reason. I have so many good midfield players I can do it, but basically we
want to play with wingers.”
Will Shevchenko still be at the club?
“Why not? He’s here.” There have been reports that he will ask Roman
Abramovich [Chelsea’s owner] if he can go back to Italy.
“He didn’t say that to me. He is working since day one, he’s playing [last
night against Club America], he does his work, his personality didn’t
change. For me he looks the same Sheva.”
Where would Michael Ballack play in this season’s preferred formations?
“I don’t know. If he plays, he plays in midfield in a 4-4-2 with only two
central midfielders. It is something he’s very used to because it’s the way
they play in the German side. In the triangle in midfield is the best
position [for him] - if he plays, because we have a lot of good players
competing for places. And he’s injured so when he comes back he will start
from zero and he will face some of the other boys already in top condition
and playing football. So I don’t think it will be easy for him.
“But he’s a top player, a top personality and he’s the kind of guy ready to
fight against that and trying to play regularly in the team.”
Do you think Chelsea will be a lot better than last season and have the
edge over Manchester United? Sir Alex Ferguson has spent a lot of money.
“Why not? I don’t see a reason why not. We were better than them three years
ago, we were better than them two years ago. Last season they did better
than us in the Premiership, we did better than them in the cups. I don’t
think there is a big difference to say that we cannot do it. I can imagine
Man United without important players like we had last season, I can imagine
they would be in big trouble.
“But they did very well last season, yes. You are saying and you are correct
that they spent some big money this season buying good players, but I think
nobody has a better squad than us. Nobody has a better squad than us.”
Do you think you have the strongest squad?
“I not saying that. I’m saying that I’m very happy with my squad. I’m afraid
of nobody, I trust my players. I think the balance that we gave to the squad
with these new boys gives us the security and protection for what can happen
during the season.” Have you had to change your approach and the way you see
things because of things that happened last season?
“No. I will try - and I think I can - to change in relation to my opponents. I
want to forget them. I will try to be totally focused on us, in what we are
doing. I will try to forget what they are doing.
“I could be speaking about they spend this money, that money so leave us
alone. Previous seasons you wrote ‘Chelsea this, Chelsea that, Chelsea buy
the title’. This season you have to say this about . . .
“. . . I don’t care. I don’t care. They can make comments about us, they can
speak about us, they can spend money and money and money. They can have the
best fixtures, we can play every Saturday after Champions League and they
play Sunday and Monday and they have more time to rest.”
Are you tired of all the psychological warfare?
“It’s a different stage. I want to be out of that.”
Do you think you have been too controversial in the past? Have you said
things and done things that you regret?
“No, no, no. I’m not saying that, it’s just a different approach to the
situation. Maybe I am getting old, I don’t know. We have an expression [in
Portugal]: the dogs are barking too much.
You weren’t given any money to strengthen your squad in the last transfer
window and you weren’t given a great deal of money this summer. An outsider
could read this as a sign that the club is not happy to give you money.
“I don’t feel it like this. In this summer transfer window I had exactly what
I want. Maybe there is a player that we didn’t sign because it was
impossible to do it, but it was not because of money, it was just because
Chelsea contacted the club and the club said, ‘Forget it’. So Chelsea closed
the door and didn’t want to make more noise about it.
“After that I had the players I want, the players I think would give us the
balance we need for the squad — [Tal] Ben Haim, [Steve] Sidwell, Pizarro.
Even without [signing] Malouda I would be happy.”
Is everything fine between you and Roman Abramovich?
“Yes. We have a professional relationship. He’s the owner of the club, I am
the club manager. I had a very good and long meeting with him. I think it’s
better to have one very good and long meeting than 10 short and bad.
“Maybe we had only one because it was holiday period, but we had a very long
meeting at Stamford Bridge last week that made everything clear between us.
There is no doubts. I know what he thinks, I know what he feels, I know what
he wants.
“He knows me as a person, he knows me as a manager, he knows the way I work.
He knows that people sometimes think I am not a communicator, but I am a
communicator. So we have an easy, long, enjoyable meeting.
So the air was cleared?
“Yeah.”
You’ve seen the hype around David Beckham here in LA. Can you imagine being
him?
“No. He is the only one. In the world of football he is the only one with this
situation. I don’t know him personally, but I imagine that the guy can
handle it, it’s the feeling I have. He played football at a high level for a
long time — he still does, not in LA Galaxy but in England when he goes back
for the national team; I think he can handle it perfectly.
“I think the guy is very special and I admire him a lot because I’m not happy
with my little celebrity life; I’m not happy with it at all. So if he has a
big celebrity life, to handle it like he does must be a top guy.”
Were you serious the other day when you said you would consider the US when
your children are grown up?
“Yes, yes, yes. And yesterday I was saying in 20 years’ time . . . It’s not in
20 years’ time because then my kids will be 30 and 28 — even before that, if
one day I have a kid that wants to come to the US for university, for a
special course, for something the US can give them, I would love to come.
“I would never change the emotion and the tension and the top football of
Europe for this, I would never do it, but maybe in 15 years’ time.”
That's something you would probably look to do at the end of our career
isn't it?
"In the end. I want to be in the top football, and to be fair the top football
in the world at this moment is no more than three countries.
"For me I keep saying England is in the top. I think there was reverse in the
situation and England is in front of Spain, in front of Italy - in spite of
Italy is world champion, Italy is European champion club no doubts about it.
But globally what the football is in many different aspects I think England
is in the top of it. I'm in my fourth season in English football if I can
from fourth to fifth to sixth to seventh to eighth I would go on without any
kind of problem. I don't have a desire to change and to try something
different - to try Italy and to try Spain - I don't have this desire, one
day that will happen naturally because I want to chase that change. I love
English football and I love to work in England.
When you say that change will take place will that be because you might be
forced to make that change?
"No. In football you never know what happens. In football you have to be ready
in my opinion for everything. But as I was saying in this moment I don't
want a change, Chelsea doesn't want a change, because if they wanted a
change they'd do it one month ago - they don't do it next week, they would
do it one month ago. So I don't want to change, Chelsea doesn't want to
change and we are together hopefully until the end of my contract in 2010.
If we go together until the end of my contract I think in that moment we'll
have time to make a decision. But to be fair I like so much English football
I would like to go on.
Is there a great deal of insecurity at your level? You don’t know from one
day to the next whether you will be the coach.
“I never felt like that. I have a friend who was sacked by a Portuguese
premiership club, and he is without a job for 1½ years because he wants to
keep at the same level, he wants to stay in the Portuguese premiership, and
he has only invitations to go [and manage] a second division club. So I
think this is the kind of insecurity you have when you can find 20, 30, 40
guys for the same kind of job.
“When you speak about people like me, and [Arsene] Wenger, and [Fabio]
Capello, and these kind of people, I think we are never afraid of the future
because we know that the next step will be again a positive step, a positive
experience, a good club, a good league. We have this security.
“What we want is to be where we are happy, and there are places where you want
to leave soon as you can, and there are places where you are and you wish to
stay for a long time. My case is the case where I want to stay for a long
time.
“For the first time after three years I bought a house in London. I’m not
renting for the first time. I didn’t buy the house because I want to sell
next week, or because I’m thinking about leaving very, very soon. So I want
to stay.
Even the great Capello can win La Liga and get dumped by Real Madrid. Can
you understand that?
“What I understand is that he’s great. And because Real Madrid [sack him] he
doesn’t become bad. He’s still great. For me he can be sacked in Madrid, he
can be sacked in the next job, he can be sacked in another job, for me the
man is great. I admire him a lot. I’m not a Madrid supporter and I’m not a
Barcelona supporter, I’m an independent guy in terms of Spain, but I was so
happy Madrid won because of him. Because of him, because he’s top.
So how can you sack a guy who has just won the league?
“I don’t know.”
Is that the madness of football?
“Yes, the football is a bit like the world. It’s a bit crazy like the world.
But for me the good thing is that [Capello] goes there, he is champion, he
did in one year what other people couldn’t do in three or four years. He
must be very proud of himself and because I like him so much I’m so happy
with it.
“During the season they spoke a lot about me as being an option there — I was
never an option there because I was never interested in that — I’m very
happy with Chelsea.”
