Frank Lampard was standing in the shower after a
training session when Jose Mourinho told him he was the best player
in the world. Casually, but with certainty, as if he was imparting
information that any coach could have worked out.
That is what he does. That is why today is the seventh
anniversary of the last league match he lost at home. February 23,
2002, Porto 2 Beira-Mar 3.
Since then, he has stayed undefeated in 38 league games at
Porto, 60 at Chelsea and 12 more at Inter Milan, who now dominate
Serie A. Mourinho is currently getting world class performances
from Adriano, a notorious waster, and Sulley Muntari, a Ghana
international who was good at Portsmouth, but not this good.
Mourinho’s brilliance is the way he can take a top player and
elevate him. John Terry and Didier Drogba have never looked better
than under his stewardship. Deco, at Porto, was the coach’s
creation. Zlatan Ibrahimovic is in the form of his life in
Italy.
The techniques Mourinho uses to manipulate situations publicly,
he utilises in private, too. He knows precisely when to drop the
bomb, which is how, at Chelsea, he turned Lampard from a very good
player into the driving force behind back-to-back title wins and a
Footballer of the Year.
‘His man management was just terrific,’ said Lampard. ‘He knew
how to get into people’s heads. He got into mine the moment he
came. He has that air of arrogance, that confidence, and it rubs
off.
‘I have never had a manager who, while I’m standing in the
shower cleaning my balls, tells me I’m the best player in the
world. He did that. I’ll never forget it. So casual. “You’re the
best player in the world, but you need to win titles”.
‘From that moment the extra confidence was in me. Not that I
thought I was the best player in the world, but the manager who had
just won the Champions League thought it. So I went out a different
player.’
That is the key to Mourinho. What you see is not the half of it.
The cleverness of the man is what happens behind closed doors. ‘His
training sessions were to the dot,’ added Lampard. ‘He was so
organised. There was always a point to what he was doing; and his
man management was the same.’
Manchester United have their work cut out this week,
particularly without Nemanja Vidic. No team have retained the
Champions League and the previous four
winners have been knocked out in the last 16 the following year, by
opposition considerably inferior to Mourinho’s Inter Milan.
After defeating Bologna on Saturday, Mourinho said he would
arrive at the training ground this week with a positive message for
his players about tomorow’s match.
He has already told Ibrahimovic he is a better player than
Cristiano Ronaldo. Maybe he was scrubbing down at the time,
too.
Maybe, if Mourinho’s inspirational powers remain, by the end of
the season his players will have something almost as precious to
clean: as Inter’s first European champions since 1965.
If that happens, just call him Goldenballs.
