So Louis van Gaal has departed and now his former assistant at Barcelona is ready for his next great challenge. But the ‘Special One’ will have to work miracles if the Red Devils are to return to the pinnacle of European football. Mourinho is one of the world’s most successful managers, having played football himself at a low level in Portugal before he made his big break after he became interpreter for Sir Bobby Robson at Sporting Lisbon, Porto and Barcelona.
He won the Champions’ League twice, with FC Porto and Inter Milan before he took over at Chelsea and then proceeded to work his magic at Real Madrid for three years.
‘The Special One’ said it was while in the Spanish capital where he saw vanity from his squad, which included Cristiano Ronaldo. “Lots of times at Real Madrid, the players would be queuing in front of the mirror before the game while the referee waited for them in the tunnel,” he said.
“But that’s how society is now. Young people care a lot about this: they are twenty something and I am fifty-three and if I want to work with kids I have to understand their world. How can I stop my players on the bus doing, er, what do you call?…Twitters and these things? How can I stop them if my daughter and my son do the same? So, I have to adapt to the moment.” He will certainly need to adapt very quickly to his new charges particularly as during his second spell at Chelsea he lost the support of the players. Dismissed by Chelsea last December after a couple of months of disastrous results, the Setúbal born coach will need all his wiles as he goes head-to-head with Pep Guardiola at Manchester City.
Even so, Mourinho has the highest win ratio (66 percent) of any manager in the Premier League. High on his target list of new players is thought to be Sporting Lisbon’s powerful central midfielder João Mario.
The 23 year-old, who has been tracked by Chelsea, Manchester City and Liverpool, would cost some €40m. Other players who could be on the move to Manchester include Antoine Griezmann (Atletico Madrid €80m), Gonzalo Higuain (Napoli €90m), John Stones (Everton €40m) and Nemanja Matic (Chelsea €30m).