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Who was that polite and humble man, and what has he done
with José Mourinho?
Bombast, arrogance, theatricality: the Mourinho hallmarks were
absent yesterday when Real Madrid unveiled their new coach. The
European champion began life at the Bernabéu by playing down
expectations and paying due deference to the club’s size and
history, as if awestruck by the magnitude of his new job despite
his infinite self-belief and vast success.
Mourinho’s best line was not about himself, but the club. “I
believe that not to coach Real leaves a void in a coach’s career,”
he said. Not quite on the self-aggrandising scale of “I’m European
champion and I think I’m a special one,” the words he famously used
to mark his arrival at Chelsea six years ago — fresh, as now, from
winning the Champions League.
Ever since, Mourinho has proved a near-paradox: an ego-warrior
who produces teams that exemplify the virtues of unselfish unity.
“The most important thing is the club, not the players, not the
coach. We are little compared with the club,” he said in response
to a question about how he would handle another Portuguese without
self-esteem issues, Cristiano Ronaldo.
The brief? Beat Barcelona and lift the Champions League. It is
as simple and as hard as that. Real were European champions three
times between 1998 and 2002 but have not progressed beyond the last
16 since 2004 and have been second-best domestically since winning
La Liga in 2008, the year Mourinho took charge at Inter Milan.
He has signed a four-year contract to succeed Manuel Pellegrini
and seeing it out would be miraculous at a club who have employed
11 coaches in the past seven years.
“I was born to be a football coach,” he said. “I am José
Mourinho and I don’t change. I arrive with all my qualities and my
defects. My attraction to Real Madrid is due to its history, its
frustrations in recent years and expectations to win. It’s a unique
club. The beauty is not so much to train or play at Real, but to
win at Real Madrid.”
There was a spiky rebuke for “unintelligent” people who “lie” by
claiming that his teams are defensive — the 47-year-old prefers to
call his sides “organised”.
In Catalonia, they were not quaking but cackling. Joan Laporta,
the outgoing Barcelona president, claimed that the appointment was
a sign of Real’s desperation and obsession with their rivals.
“They’re in a situation where Barcelona is winning everything, and
the fact they’re not winning creates a sense that Barcelona is the
reference point,” he said.
The relative lack of triumphalism in Madrid may reflect the
sticky nature of Mourinho’s divorce from Inter. It took several
days for Massimo Moratti, the Inter president, to reach a
compensation agreement with Florentino Pérez, his Real
counterpart.
As soon as Inter had beaten Bayern Munich in the Champions
League final in Madrid on May 22, machinations to secure Mourinho a
permanent seat in the Bernabéu dugout were under way in earnest.
His decision to jettison Inter for Real was cold-eyed and
pragmatic, yet has taken a sentimental toll.
He was filmed sobbing as he cuddled Marco Materazzi, the Inter
defender. Hard to imagine Sir Alex Ferguson ever doing that with
Gary Neville.