Plenty to say: Ex-Blues boss Mourinho
Jose Mourinho has dismissed the chances of
Liverpool or
Arsenal being crowned Barclays
Premier League champions this season.
The former
Chelsea boss is predicting a three-way battle between
his old employers and Manchester rivals City and
United.
The Blues sit top after two games with the Gunners, City and
United just behind.
'I believe Chelsea, Man United and Man City, that's it,'
Mourinho said.
Liverpool have just one point after crashing 3-0 at Eastlands on
Monday night and Mourinho does not expect things to get much better
for the Anfield outfit.
He said: 'It's very difficult for (new Liverpool manager) Roy
Hodgson as over the last three years they have been getting worse,
worse and worse. He needs time.'
'The Liverpool of 2004 was better than the Liverpool of 2005 and
the 2005 [team] was better than 2006.
'It is very difficult for Roy to make Liverpool champions.I
think he needs time and it’s not easy because I don’t think that
the club went in the right direction and I don’t think Arsenal
too.
'Year after year it looks like [success], but no, looks like,
but no. Always the same type of comment, ‘it’s a young team’, ‘it
will be next season’.
'I remember when we [Chelsea] played them [Arsenal] in a
Carling Cup semi-final when they played the ‘team of young
boys’.
'The ‘team of young boys’ is not any more the team of young boys
now, they are the team of 25, 26, 27-year-olds.
'So [Cesc] Fabregas, [Theo] Walcott, [Gael] Clichy, [Alex] Song,
[Bacary] Sagna, they are not any more a team of young kids, they
are a team in the age to win things.
'But I do not think they will do it. I think it will again
be Man United, Chelsea and of course Man City, because they have a
great squad.'
Real Madrid manager Mourinho admitted he was blown away by
City's spending power this summer as Roberto Mancini beat the
Spanish giants to the signing of Serbia full-back Aleksander
Kolarov.
Kolarov joined City last month for £16million as part of another
remarkable summer of team strengthening which has seen their Middle
East owners splash out more than £120m.
And Mourinho, who joined Madrid after leading Inter Milan to a
domestic and European treble last season, concedes even they can't
compete.
Top of the pile: Chelsea celebrate putting six past
Wigan on Saturday
'I understand that if someone wants to compete with them
for a player it is very difficult, they are dominant in the
market,' he said.
'The player they say they want is the player they get. 'I was
interested in Kolarov when I came here but I couldn't compete with
them as they went to values that I couldn't.
'If they have the money they can do it, if they have the
ambition to win the Premier League they can do it.'
Mourinho will keep a close eye on former Inter Milan striker
Mario Balotelli's progress at Eastlands.
City slickers: Balotelli is reunited with
Mancini
The Italy striker left the San Siro in a £23m move and
Mourinho said: 'I had some problem because he is a kid and because
a coach always wants to educate a kid and always wants a kid to go
in the right direction - it’s like at home with a
son.
'Mario has incredible potential, he has every football quality
to adapt to the Premiership, he has all the conditions to succeed,
he’s a boy with a lot of potential.
'[Roberto] Mancini knows him very, very well, that’s why he
bought him. Now it’s time for him to grow up as a person, more
stability in his life, more stability in his private life and to
understand, like I was teaching him every day, that a boy of 19, 20
years old has a lot to learn and that he is not the end
product.
'If he goes in the right direction he can be a great success in
English football. But it depends on him, the people that
surround him and people that have to help him and not make his life
more difficult.'