Inter Milan v Chelsea: rhapsody in Blue by maestro Jose Mourinho

By Henry Winter Published: 7:00AM GMT twenty-four February 2010

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Life"s a catwalk for that grand engineer of footballing dreams, Jose Mourinho, who warmed up for Wednesday evening"s Champions League tie opposite Chelsea, his old club, with a pick up of confidant statements.

Mourinho"s meetings with the media are piece love-in, piece fireworks party. On Tuesday, holding justice at Appiano Gentile, north of Milan, Inter"s physical preparation instructor kept lobbing small written firecrackers, divulgence how he has phoned Ashley Cole to give the Chelsea left-back await by uneasy times, how close he came to handling England and how he felt Carlo Ancelotti was a part of of "the clan"". He meant the Italian football establishment, but the internal media did not know that page to hold front, at the back of or political.

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Watching from the at the back of of the room were Mourinho"s clinging backroom staff, informed faces from his Stamford Bridge days. They listened enrapt by their master"s voice, admiring the plumes of fume trailing from his each utterance. For all the clearly unenlightened inlet of the whizzing repartee-filled rockets, this was a well-planned show, deftly crafted to bleed gasps and whoops, to broadcast messages.

Just as the good Bob Paisley used to palm out "toffees"" to hostile players on the eve of severe European matches, softening unfamiliar stars up with praise, so Mourinho dipped in to a large box of candy for his old Chelsea cohorts. He eulogised "Didier"", "John"", "Frank"" and "Ashley"", as if recalling loving college friends, but laced his tributes with the perceptibly secluded subtext that such players had grown underneath him. This was a rhapsody in Blue with an agenda. Mourinho has a heart but additionally a mind that seeks any advantage.

Throw Mourinho a taste and he fast cooks up a banquet. At the discuss of Drogba once noticed he would happily mangle both his legs off in the constant use of Mourinho, the former Chelsea physical preparation instructor responded with postulated eloquence.

"The majority pleasing thing in football for a physical preparation instructor is the passion and apply oneself of his players and the supporters. That happens with me all the time in Porto, Chelsea and Inter. That creates me proud.

"What Didier keeps observant about myself creates me unapproachable but I know what will occur [tonight]. I know he will mangle his legs for his group and his group is Chelsea.

"On the alternative dais is a crony [Mourinho], someone who additionally admires him, someone with a opposite design to his. Didier will give everything.

"That"s something that additionally creates me unequivocally proud, as it"s the preparation I gave to the players. I discuss it players to give their most appropriate all the time, for their clubs and their inhabitant team. Didier does that and I will be blissful to see him.""

When Mourinho was asked either he had took off the climb of Terry and Lampard in to vital forces he acquired the see of Colonel Tom Parker reflecting on Elvis Presley"s early years. "You"re scold that John and Frank perform week after week, year after year,"" Mourinho replied. "They see as if they are never sleepy of personification well. Did I give them a small contribution? They contend yes and I think so. I appreciate them since they never dont think about my contribution.

"When I verbalise with somebody at the bar [Chelsea] they regularly contend that the enlightenment of operative tough each day did not change. The players have kept their clever mentality. The years are going and they are similar to Port wine. The comparison the better.""

So there you have it. He still communicates with people inside the Bridge, Terry and Lampard impetus to a kick that Mourinho, the Mozart of the technical area, composed, and when it comes to the most appropriate tipples in Europe to toast Chelsea, zero beats the excellent dump of Graham"s, Taylor"s or Cockburn"s from the banks of his dear Douro.

Short of wearing a T-shirt dogmatic "I Love Chelsea"", clasping a duplicate of Chopper Harris"s journal and rising in to a rousing delivery of "10 men went to mow"", Mourinho could not have spoken his indebtedness for his old bar more.

Concerned about Cole"s made at home and damage problems, Mourinho contacted his former left-back. "I called him a integrate of days ago since I caring about him. I wished him a very, unequivocally discerning liberation [from ankle surgery].""

Chelsea are approaching to excellent Cole for the annoyance his purported exploits have brought on the club. "I watched Ashley fool around until the impulse he had his damage and he played superbly. If he has problems afterwards they are not on the pitch. I think Ancelotti contingency give him advice, his family contingency give him recommendation and he contingency think for himself, but if he unequivocally wants my recommendation he should stay in England.""

Just as Mourinho is informed with Chelsea players, so he argued that Ancelotti "knows everything"" about Inter. Reminded that Ancelotti had have a criticism construed as definition that all Italy were at the back of him and Chelsea, Mourinho replied waspishly: "If Ancelotti says that it"s since he knows, since somebody told him or since he belongs to the clan.""

Mourinho portrayed himself as the outsider, the insurgent with a cause, and that was overturning the determined order. He additionally attempted to mobilize the English public, rising in to a counterclaim of Terry, sacked as England captain, and careering at breathless gait in to how he roughly succeeded Steve McClaren, that would have been the high following the ridiculous.

"You"re right that John was a illusory captain for me, but I"m not the England manager. I motionless at the last notation not to be. For a unfamiliar physical preparation instructor to have the probability to lead England I was the proudest man in the world.

"I thought and thought. I was fighting myself. On one side I longed for it, on an additional side I knew it was not the pursuit for me. Not for my mentality, my passion for football and for precision each day. But England chose a good, experienced physical preparation instructor [Fabio Capello] who"s you do a good job. And since I love England I goal he keeps on you do unequivocally well, keeps carrying the mental condition and because not the being of creation something unequivocally critical for your country?""

His last space station lit, Mourinho left in a fire of handshakes and back-slaps for the small English media fortuitous benefaction at Appiano Gentile. Nobody plays to the art studio improved than Mourinho, a man who won"t go out of conform for English tastes.