Chelsea’s current manager Jose Mourinho is regarded as one of the best managers of this generation. The 52 year old Portuguese mastermind has been successful throughout his career and won many important honours for every team he managed.
The legendary manager is in the headlines regularly not only for his success but also for his controversial comments regarding players and managers.
The most recent person to hit out the Chelsea manager is the wife of current Real Madrid manager Rafael Benitez. Mrs. Benitez had jokingly commented that they were cleaning up the messes left by Jose Mourinho. She intended to say that her husband Rafa Benitez has taken up charges of three clubs whom Mourinho had managed previously.
He said, “The only club where her husband replaces me was at Inter Milan, where in six months he destroyed the best team in Europe at the time. And for her also to think about me and to speak about me, I think the lady needs to occupy her time. And if she takes care of her husband’s diet, she will have less time to speak about me.”
Let me take you to a journey back to the most special comments by the special one:
1) On Rafael Benitez’s Inter Milan winning the Club World Cup, a trophy the Italians qualified for by winning the Champions League under Mourinho
“I thought he was going to thank me for the title I gave him. Inter fans would tell you how they really feel about it.”
2) On taking the Chelsea job
“If I wanted to have an easy job I would have stayed at Porto. Beautiful blue chair, the UEFA Champions League trophy, God, and after God, me.”
3) On Mourinho’s Porto beating Manchester United in the Champions League
“I understand why he (Alex Ferguson) is a bit emotional. He has some of the top players in the world and they should be doing a lot better than that.”
“You would be sad if your team gets as clearly dominated by opponents who have been built on 10% of the budget.”
4) On winning the Europa League (and another dig at Benitez, who achieved the feat with Chelsea before Mourinho’s return to Stamford Bridge)
“I don’t want to win the Europa League. It would be a big disappointment for me. I don’t want my players to feel the Europa League is our competition.”
5) On eggs (yes, really)
“Omelettes, eggs. No eggs, no omelettes. And it depends on the quality of the eggs in the supermarket. They are class one, two or three and some are more expensive than others and some give you better omelettes. When the class one eggs are not available you have a problem.”
6) On his rivalry with former Barcelona manager Frank Rijkaard
“My history as a manager cannot be compared with Frank Rijkaard’s history. He has zero trophies and I have a lot of them.”
7) On a Chelsea injury crisis
“It’s like having a blanket that is too small for the bed. You pull the blanket up to keep your chest warm and your feet stick out. I cannot buy a bigger blanket because the supermarket is closed. But the blanket is made of cashmere.”
8) On being asked about rotating Arjen Robben, Joe Cole and Damien Duff
“Why drive Aston Martin all the time, when i have Ferrari and Porsche as well? That would just be stupid”
9) After Asier Del Horno was sent off in Chelsea’s defeat against Barcelona in February 2006
“Barcelona is a cultural city with many great theatres and this boy [Lionel Messi] has learned very well. He’s learned play-acting.”
10) After Carvalho blasted Mourinho for not picking him to play
“Ricardo Carvalho seems to have problems understanding things, maybe he should have an IQ test, or go to a mental hospital or something”
11) Putting to bed any doubt that Roman Abramovich has a say in picking the team
“If Roman Abramovich helped me out in training we would be bottom of the league and if I had to work in his world of big business, we would be bankrupt!”
12) On Arsene Wenger
“I think he is one of these people who is a voyeur. He likes to watch other people. There are some guys who, when they are at home, have a big telescope to see what happens in other families. He speaks, speaks, speaks about Chelsea.”
13) Announcing his arrival in typical Jose style at Chelsea
“Please don’t call me arrogant, but I’m European champion and I think I’m a special one.”
14) Here is his modesty
“You can’t win the treble every season. But I’ve done it twice and I think twice is quite a lot.”
15) Mourinho being called afraid of failure by Arsene Wenger
“Am I afraid of failure? He is a specialist in failure. I’m not. So if one supposes he’s right and I’m afraid of failure, it’s because I don’t fail many times. So maybe he’s right. I’m not used to failing. But the reality is he’s a specialist because, eight years without a piece of silverware, that’s failure.”