Chelsea FC - Jose Mourinho and his Little Horse

If you are a fan of a club that isn’t Chelsea FC, Jose Mourinho must be the most irritating person on the face of the planet right about now.

And who can blame you, really? In his first award-winning stint as Chelsea manager, Jose Mourinho went out of his way to rub you the wrong way. In the rare event of Chelsea losing a game, Mourinho would blame the referee, the pitch, the crowd, the linesmen and a freak meteor shower on the other side of the planet as reasons his side didn’t win the game. Humility in victory wasn’t forthcoming either. Chelsea fans loved him not only because of his Midas touch, but because of his incredible ability to get inside the minds and under the skins of others. The quiet club was quiet no more.

A sudden departure followed by radically successful stints at other clubs, gained him a large fan circle and an even larger number of detractors. So why would a quite evidently humbler Mourinho, drive people even madder? Mostly, it’s because nobody – not even his most ardent supporters – buys his claim that he’s turned over a new leaf.

The idea that Mourinho, with his quieter demeanor, is a new man terrifies us Chelsea supporters. We want him to remain the cocky, sharp-tongued, attention-grabbing genius that he is. Primarily, because it takes the heat off the team. When your opponents are squandering their breath booing a man who isn’t likely to leave the dugout or go beyond the touchline, it makes the team’s job that much easier.

That’s precisely why, Mourinho’s latest quip about Chelsea being a little horse (Buttercup or something), trying to making it in the big leagues against the likes of Bucephalus and Secretariat, irritates so many across the league. Nobody truly believes he really buys that claim.

Now an ordinary manager engaging in some self-deprecation would be rightfully accused of trying to play down expectations should he end the season without silverware. But this is Mourinho, we’re talking about. Surely there’s a deeper more insidious twist to all of this.

Perhaps, having successfully played down his side’s title ambitions this season, Mourinho’s actually planning a post-title-winning press conference celebration with mock gunfire and an Al Pacino-esque style “Say hello to my little horsey“. What more devilish glee could the Special One derive from his return than having behaved himself throughout the season, only to “surprise” everyone at the very end. The twist in the tale, as it were. Except that would be too obvious, for someone with a degree in the dark arts.

So what else could this new modesty be disguising? Perhaps Mourinho is trying to muscle newer more favorable contracts out of his older players whose contracts are coming up for renewal. If Mourinho publicly proclaims his team are still going through a renewal, the ability of a player to position himself as being integral to a title-winning march this year and therefore deserving of a more generous contract is suddenly considerably lower.

Mata being forced out, and the sight of Lampard, Ashley Cole and Essien on the bench followed by the ingenious stringing along of John Terry on yearly renewable contracts, have effectively swung the balance of power the way of Chelsea’s boardroom. No mean feat considering lesser managers at Chelsea FC have seen their careers go up in flames for having merely fantasized about similar plans.

Mourinho’s modest “We’re a little horse” assessment is also quite possibly his way of getting older, established stalwarts to see their gigs are gradually but surely coming to an end. If Chelsea’s manager acknowledges his team is undergoing a critical transition phase, that should send alarm bells ringing among the erstwhile spine. For it signifies one inescapable fact to them: there’s a little horse looking for new jockeys.

It might also be Mourinho’s way of subtly thumbing his nose at Roman Abramovich. The Russian billionaire spent millions acquiring Chelsea, and sprucing it up, not to mention having gone back (hat in hand) to Jose Mourinho to take charge of a position he had once made his own. Mourinho understands Roman is stuck with him for the foreseeable future, and would lose whatever momentum Chelsea can hope to achieve if he dared fire Jose again. Surely Mourinho understands that calling Chelsea a little horse with no hope of landing the Kentucky derby this season, will leave Roman Abramovich – a man fixated on big things – to teeth-gnashing frustration. For all the reasons Roman may have bought Chelsea FC, an exercise in modesty it certainly wasn’t.

Or there could be another more conservative reason: Mourinho is keen to force his bosses, the hard-to-please Abramovich and Buck, lower their lofty expectations for this season. It makes Mourinho’s job just much easier if the board willingly accepts a season without a trophy long enough for Jose to buy a couple of world-class strikers. No one reasonable enough could realistically blame a little horse for not winning the big leagues, could they? It really is a masterful way of buying time, that old enemy of Chelsea managers.

There is just one other remaining reason for Mourinho’s humble assessment. It’s his way of staying where he loves: in the spotlight. In a sea of managers who’ve grown accustomed to reciting cliches and scripted monologues, Mourinho’s USP is his willingness to say what everyone least expects him to. Surely, he sees the irony in accusing West Ham of “19th Century football” when he invented it. He knows the vitriol he will elicit when he refers to certain unnamed managers needing to buy the biggest names. He knows the tabloids will have a field day reporting that he delegated team talk responsibilities to the Scottish masseur.

And that’s why he says what he says: because nobody really knows what he’s thinking. Nobody wants a world where Mourinho toes the line, and says the safest and blandest things. Nobody, especially not his biggest critics.

And Mourinho’s content to leave it that way.

Tags: Chelsea FC Jose Mourinho

Chelsea FC – Jose Mourinho and his Little Horse

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