Jose Mourinho: Controversy as a lifestyle

Ironically, Mourinho is a coach with an unbelievable winning aura. Everywhere he goes success seems to trail him. Mourinho got global notice when he won the 94/95 prestigious UEFA Champions League with little known FC Porto in his native Portugal. It was that singular feat that caught the attention of the soccer world and, of course, gave him the breakthrough he had in his coaching career.

Ever since, he had never looked back. In his first spell at Chelsea FC, he made the club Premier League champions for the first time in fifty years. While in Italy with Seria A giants, Inter Milan of Italy, Mourinho’s pedigree as a winner soared to greater heights. He spent just two seasons with the team and won almost everything there was to be won. In his second and last season at Inter, Mourinho won the three available trophies namely the Italian Seria A title, the FA Cup and the UEFA Champions League. At Real Madrid in Spain, Mourinho was equally successful as he won a couple of trophies in his three seasons at the club.

 Till date, Mourinho remains one of the very few football managers in the world that has won league titles in the three major football leagues of the world namely England, Italy and Spain. This, indeed, explains why he is one of the highest paid and most sought after coaches in the world. This, of course, is where it all ends for Mourinho who is a very controversial personality. Anywhere he goes, trouble follows him.

For Mourinho, trouble and controversies are part of his trade. While at Portuguese Club, FC Porto where he got his career breakthrough, Mourinho had a running battle with the club’s hierarchy. It was so bad that when the team won the prestigious UEFA Champions League title in the 2004/2005 season, Mourinho was not part of the celebration. Indeed, it was reported that out of anger he threw his winner’s medal into the crowd, went into the locker room, packed his things and left the team he had led to an unprecedented victory, unceremoniously.

Such has since been his style. In his first spell as the coach of Chelsea FC, he was alleged to have had heated arguments with the billionaire owner of the club, Russian born Romans Abramovich. He reportedly stormed the team’s training session the following day and announced he was quitting. While in Italy, the story remained the same. Mourinho brought successes and glory to Inter Milan FC, but so also was trouble.  While at Madrid, Mourinho was modestly successful. But then, he couldn’t stop courting trouble. Things became so bad that Mourinho accused some of his players of being moles that leaked out his team’s tactics to opposing teams.

With his departure from the Spanish capital, England was his next destination where he began his second spell as Chelsea’s manager. According to reports, the initial plan of the club’s owner was to make Mourinho one of the longest serving coaches at Chelsea in the order of former Manchester United manager, Sir Alex Ferguson and ex Arsenal manager, Arsene Wenger. His recent sack, after only 24 months has, however, cut short this possibility. As usual, Mourinho brought controversies and trouble back to the English Premiership.

Both on and off the field, he was a handful. When he was not trouble shooting with the referees, he was having a dig at the English FA. Former Arsenal manager, Arsene Wenger, with whom Mourinho never see eye to eye, was soon to fall under the caustic tongue of the latter. Mourinho referred to Wenger as a ‘specialist in failure’, an assertion that was seen as a huge act of disrespect to the moderately successful Wenger who had won the English Premiership three times and the English FA Cup six times (more than any other coach in the cup’s history).

On the field of play, whenever he had bad results, Mourinho blamed everyone except himself. That has always been his style. When things are rosy, he basks in the glory as the ‘special one’. But when things get bad, it is either some of his players are moles or they are outrightly betraying him. Mourinho’s recent ordeal is a pointer to the fact that talent isn’t enough to manage success. He is a successful manager, no doubt. But he seems to have become a prisoner to his successes.

 Ogunbiyi is of the Ministry of Information & Strategy, Alausa, Ikeja