• Chelsea face reunion with former manager at
Internazionale
Carlo
Ancelotti has vowed not to be provoked by José
Mourinho's trademark "mind games" after the draw for the knockout
phase of the Champions
League gave the Special One a mouth-watering
return to Chelsea
with Internazionale.
Mourinho's return to Stamford Bridge, where he won the club's
first league titles in half a century during a glittering
three-and-a-half-year spell, that catches the imagination,
particularly given the strained relationship he endured with
Ancelotti, then at Milan, in Serie A last season.
The pair clashed verbally as Mourinho claimed the Serie A title
for Inter but failed to secure the club's principal objective, the
European Cup. "There were some problems, some questions and
discussions in the papers, but I like him as a coach," said
Ancelotti. "He's a fantastic coach who won in Portugal, in England,
in Italy. Everywhere. But I'm not able to discuss his character. I
will speak of him as a coach and nothing else. It isn't a problem
that we don't have a good relationship. This can be a good
opportunity to improve that.
"It will be an emotional game for him. He did a fantastic job
here, so to play against Chelsea won't be easy for him. But this
match is Chelsea versus Inter, a football match between two of the
most important teams in Europe. Nothing else. I have experience [of
what he'll try to do] but I'm not ready to play mind games. I never
will be ready to play these games. I prefer to play football
matches and I've never thought that a football game is a match
between coaches. I will try and find a weakness in their team but
not in a fellow coach."
Ancelotti was more critical of Mourinho in his autobiography,
Preferisco la Coppa, in which he referred to the Inter coach as
"His Mourinhoness, comparing himself to Jesus" and "His
Specialness". The pair went head-to-head in pre-season, when
Chelsea won 2-0 in a friendly in Pasadena yet both avoided talk of
their frosty past. The Chelsea chief executive, Ron Gourlay, said
the former manager's return would be "spectacular" yet, for all
that Mourinho will be afforded a tumultuous reception by fans, it
could prove an awkward obstacle for the London side.
"Going back to Stamford Bridge will be an added motivation for
Mourinho," said the Inter president, Massimo Moratti, who had seen
the Portuguese's relationship with the Chelsea owner, Roman
Abramovich, steadily deteriorate. "It's better to have those strong
motivations and, against Chelsea, we'll certainly have those."