So after roughly two and a half seasons totalling 927 days Jose Mourinho’s second spell as Chelsea manager has come to an abrupt and undignified end.
With football they say “never go back” but nobody believed the second spell curse would strike Mourinho and Chelsea. First time around it was a marriage made in heaven as self-dubbed ‘Chosen One’ led the Blues to back-to-back titles in 2004/05 and 2005/06, their first in the Premier League, as well as one FA Cup and two League Cups.
Even the second stint appeared to be going well when Chelsea won the Premier League title last season and added another League Cup for good measure. Since the start of the season though not only have the wheels come off but as analogies go the windscreen’s smashed and the radiator has more holes than a Leeds United back four.
Where did Mourinho go wrong then? Was it his fault or are the players to blame? Anyone who read my three part article around six weeks ago will have seen that I felt that the warning signs were there around twelve months ago, certainly for some of the aspects of our downfall.
Other aspects have come to light as the season has progressed. Let me make one thing clear though as the subject of Mourinho has divided fans for long enough now. Whether you are a fan who feels the club should still have Mourinho in charge or whether you are one who feels it was the right decision to part ways we all love the club, it is the club that must come first and it is the club that will survive. We are all fans who must pull together to get our boys to the end of the season and build from there.
My fear is that those who blame the players for Mourinho’s exit will turn on the team and that will achieve nothing. Whether it starts now or at the end of the season we will hopefully have a fresh regime, a fresh start and with any luck a fresh outlook. I’m thankful to Jose for all that he’s done for us but it’s the future that matters more than the past. Looking around, I see too many fans who seem to support him more than the club and would rather lose with him in charge than win without him.
For me Jose’s biggest failing is inflexibility. Strangely enough, it’s also been his biggest strength as well because when that single-mindedness works well then it delivers all the riches the game has to offer. It is his strength of opinion bordering on stubbornness that led many to believe he is the best manager in the world and earned him the devotion of the Stamford Bridge faithful.
When that plan doesn’t work though it is very difficult for someone with that mindset to not only change the direction they are heading in but also to see what the problem actually is. We have to remember that since he burst onto the scene winning the UEFA Champions League with FC Porto in 2004 he has hardly put a foot wrong.
So after winning a succession of trophies for over 10 years in Portugal, England, Italy and Spain, it is understandable for him to believe that what he did would always work. Therefore, when what he is doing fails to work surely it must be the fault of other people or outside forces?
This season he appears to have blamed everything and everybody for Chelsea’s downfall apart from himself. Perhaps if he had a Plan B, a different way of managing his players, a different tactic other than his 4-2-3-1 formation or a different tactical mentality then maybe things would have turned around by now and he would still be in charge.
So what else went wrong? Well, the warning signs were flashing to me in the 5-3 New Years Day defeat to Tottenham Hotspur. The second half of the season was classic Mourinho with a solid defence keeping a clean sheet while we grabbed the odd goal up top. After January, we only scored three goals in three other matches so it was clear that if the defence faltered we would be in trouble.
In that game against Spurs I saw clearly how easily Branislav Ivanovic was exposed as his over-exuberant forays upfield left gaps in his position that Willian and Gary Cahill had to fill. Everyone ignored Ivanovic’s defensive lapses because he weighed in with vital goals but that in itself highlighted another issue – we were relying on a right back for goals!
Throw in John Terry’s lack of pace meaning we had to play a horribly deep back line every time he played I thought it would be clear to all what we needed in the summer. Diego Costa’s temperament was another problem for me and he was the first big name I would have replaced in the summer. I said he would cost us in a match and he proved that with his silly antics with Gabriel (who was also to blame) in the Arsenal match this season. My shopping list, therefore, had a right back, centre back, a striker and even a central midfield partner for Nemanja Matic for when Cesc Fabregas doesn’t cut it.
When the new season started with a few like-for-like at best transfers in and out I soon realised we were not going to be a stronger team than we were in 2014/15. The rest of our rivals all strengthened (especially Manchester City) but we stood still and for me that was an arrogant stance.
We were told throughout July and August that John Stones was our number one target but yet again where was our ‘Plan B’, our contingency plan. When he didn’t sign we had a panic move for Papy Djilobodji who has gathered nothing but bench splinters since he arrived. Baba Rahman arrived at left back to release Cesar Azpilicueta to move to right back but that rarely happened. Even when Ivanovic suffered bad match after bad match Mourinho persisted with his favoured Serbian rather than admit he was wrong to select him.
That stubbornness again. Perhaps my dream signings of Raphael Varane, Paul Pogba and Gonzalo Higuain would have cost more than we could afford but something close would have at least improved the side and signalled intent to the rest of the league.
Away from the transfer market things soon fell apart elsewhere. A series of events that appeared to lose the dressing room for Mourinho and no matter how many players kept saying they were all behind him and they were all in it together it didn’t seem that way on the pitch.
Mourinho gave the team an extended summer break which left them starting the season short on form and match fitness. Then there’s the well documented Eva Carneiro incident which many believe was the beginning of the end.
Had he eaten some humble pie and issued an apology the matter would have been resolved I’m sure, but the situation reached such a point that I’m sure even the players started to wonder whether their manager was starting to lose a card or two from the deck.
The following weeks and months hardly had a match go by without a post-match interview where the manager would blame the referee for costing us the match. That kind of attitude to galvanise the team together with an ‘us against the world’ attitude can only work if everyone buys into the justification. If the players don’t agree with the manager’s views then it will (and did) cause division.
The results could have improved and Mourinho may have kept his job if only one of these issues was the problem but the 2015/16 season at Stamford Bridge has so far been a perfect storm for failure. When Costa’s goals dried up Mourinho refused to pick Loic Remy and instead either kept the Spaniard in the side in the hope that his goals returned or in recent games played Eden Hazard there, a left midfielder who hasn’t scored all season. If the goals were flowing then the defensive frailties could be overlooked but when we lost everyone pointed fingers at the back line.
Hopefully, with Gus Hiddink in charge, we have a manager who will let the attacking players like Hazard, Oscar, Willian and Pedro play their natural game. The attacking midfielders should be able to use their natural talents to beat the opposition rather than being shackled with defensive duties that stifle their skills.
