Jose Mourinho’s reputation was already irreparably damaged long before it reached its nadir.
On joining Chelsea in the summer of 2004 we were amused and fascinated by this bullish personality who proclaimed himself to be ‘special’ and because of his undeniable box-office appeal and outlandish comments so many of us fell under his spell, particularly the media.
Only then, his long-running feud with Arsene Wenger took a dark turn, and things were said that crossed a moral line, and in 2006 Mourinho made baseless accusations about referee Anders Frisk after a Champions League defeat that led to the Swede receiving death threats.
Some years later, in the midst of a touchline brawl between Real Madrid and Barcelona players and staff, Mourinho sneak-attacked Barca’s assistant coach Tito Vilanova, poking him dangerously in the eye.
All of which meant that when the Portuguese scowler returned to Stamford Bridge for a second spell in 2013, he was commonly viewed through an altogether different prism. A serial winner he may be, but Jose Mourinho was also considered a deeply unpleasant man.
These negative traits however were hardly in evidence across his first two seasons back in England, not with Chelsea revitalised and becoming a prominent feature once again in the football betting odds, finishing third in 2014, then lifting a fourth Premier League title twelve months later.
That was until Mourinho was denied his top transfer targets in the next window. In public, the manger was vitriolic, openly criticising his board. In private, he brooded, and this was always a worrying sign.
It was usually an omen that something bad was about to happen.
We did not have long to wait either, because on the opening afternoon of the 2015/16 season – eight years ago today – Chelsea hosted Swansea, who caused the Blues all manner of problems, equalising from the spot after goalkeeper Thibaut Courtois saw red and playing the better football thereafter.
Late in the game, Eden Hazard went down with a knock and Mourinho was incensed to see first team doctor Eva Carneiro and physio John Fearn race onto the pitch to treat the injured player, castigating Carneiro as she passed him, and continuing to vent his ire on her return.
“I was not happy with my medical staff,” he complained to Sky Sports after the final whistle. “They left me with eight players for a counter attack.” Mourinho went on to call Carneiro ‘naïve’.
It was a meltdown that naturally enough became the main talking point of the weekend and shell-shocked to find herself on every back page, Carneiro must have been reassured to receive a text from Chelsea chairman Bruce Buck that evening, informing her that the club accepted she was simply doing her job, and attributing the incident merely to Mourinho ‘ranting’.
We can only imagine her confusion therefore when she later received a subsequent message from Buck, notifying her that she could only return in an ‘adjusted role’, away from first team duties. This was allegedly at Mourinho’s instruction.
Carneiro soon after resigned.
A court case followed, one that reached settlement in June 2016 and one that unsurprisingly was covered enthusiastically by the press, and perhaps the most interesting detail that emerged concerned what Mourinho was alleged to have called Carneiro as the doctor returned to the dug-out, after merely assisting an injured player.
It was Carneiro’s assertion that she was called “Filha da puta,” which translates as a daughter of a women of ill-repute whereas Mourinho insisted he said ‘filho da puta’, that places ‘son’ at the beginning of the sentence and is a phrase he claimed to use regularly in training to express exasperation.
Either way, sacked that December for presiding over a terrible run of results, Mourinho didn’t come out of the whole sorry episode well as further scales fell from our eyes.
Now at Roma, what’s the betting there will be another sorry episode too, and one after that, as a serial winner competes in the same headspace with the traits of a deeply unpleasant man.
*Credit for all of the photos in this article belongs to AP Photo*
