[情報] Where did it all go wrong, Jose?
http://sport.independent.co.uk/football/chelsea/article354957.ece
Where did it all go wrong, Jose?
2 April 2006 23:21
By Sam Wallace and Jason Burt
Published: 01 April 2006
Chelsea's team meeting in the aftermath of defeat to Fulham on 19 March was,
those who witnessed it have said, a diatribe from Jose Mourinho about all he
had achieved for his squad of players and how they had let him down. As the
mood darkened, the Chelsea manager asked if anyone wanted to make a point -
when the striker Carlton Cole raised his hand, some in the room anticipated
the worst.
Cole's question was simple but, given the circumstances, not particularly
well-timed: "When," he asked, "am I going to get my chance?" Mourinho's temper
exploded and he turned on Cole while the rest of those present were reduced to
staring at their feet in embarrassment. For a team nine points clear in the
Premiership, the atmosphere in the room was not that of a club making serene
progress to their second consecutive Premiership title.
Chelsea face Birmingham City at lunchtime today with the opportunity to put
12 points between themselves and second-placed Manchester United, the title
itself could be won by 17 April but life at Stamford Bridge only seems to get
more complicated. There are doubts over Mourinho's future and struggles for
power and preferment in Roman Abramovich's administration. On the pitch, the
recent cheating allegations that have surrounded Didier Drogba and Shaun
Wright-Phillips have earned the new force in English football a backlash in
public opinion that has discomfited even a club as powerful as Chelsea.
As he did yesterday, Mourinho has, for most of this year, refused to hold his
Friday briefings with the press, the same press he kept busy for most of last
season with some of the most outspoken opinions and insights of any recent
Premiership manager. How radically times have changed. With elimination from
the Champions' League, and criticism of his own tactics, he has found the mood
of newspapers much more difficult to control then he ever did in Portugal and
has chosen to boycott, rather than to engage, with his critics.
The rumours linking Mourinho to Internazionale two weeks ago were flatly
denied by the Chelsea manager within hours but at a club where the ground is
always shifting he knows better than anyone that an exit strategy is crucial.
He has grown tired of having to defend the club alone against rising
unpopularity and is battling to keep control of Chelsea's transfer policy.
The signing of Michael Ballack this summer will be his choice but the
acquisition of a top international striker has been impressed upon him by
the club's hierarchy as absolutely crucial. There are growing signs that
Abramovich is being more interventionist at the club, assuming greater control
in its running through the deployment of Frank Arnesen, the head of scouting
and coaching. The 49-year-old Dane, who was poached from Tottenham Hotspur
last year, has notionally become Abramovich's personal scout in the hunt
for potential new players. It is a development that has not gone unnoticed by
Mourinho.
The Chelsea chief executive, Peter Kenyon, is also keen to protect his
position as the man in charge of transfer and contract negotiations. Arnesen
is regarded as a figure whose urbanity could repair some of the damage done
to Chelsea's public image, although any further promotion of a man whose
main job is scouting teenagers would be hard for Mourinho to bear.
In the statement that followed the Internazionale rumours, Mourinho said
simply that he had a contract with Chelsea until 2010 - "I am happy with the
club. The club are happy with me." However, as a man who left Benfica after
just nine games, there is no doubt he would leave Chelsea should he feel he
has reached the point where control of the club - its transfer policy and
its public pronouncements - has slipped beyond his reach.
There are understood to be serious misgivings at the club about the number of
diving or cheating incidents Chelsea players have been involved in this season
and the debilitating effect they are having on the club's profile. After he
reacted theatrically to a glove in the face from Liverpool goalkeeper Jose
Reina at Stamford Bridge on 2 February, Arjen Robben was rebuked by senior
players at Chelsea in the dressing room immediately after the match as they
watched replays of the incident in disbelief. More recent episodes involving
Drogba and Wright-Phillips have hinted at a policy, imposed on the players, to
make the most of any contact with an opponent. Mourinho's strong relationship
with his players, a hallmark of last season's success, has become more
strained. There was genuine sympathy for Carlton Cole whose public
dressing-down came after weeks of being told that he would get his first-team
opportunity. After Mourinho's rebuke of Joe Cole following the victory over
Birmingham City on New Year's Eve, some of the players privately said that
their manager had gone too far and picked on the wrong individual especially
when others were clearly underperforming.
After the defeat to Fulham, Mourinho made a point of tearing up the notes he
had made during the match in a pointed gesture designed to suggest that the
best-laid plans had been undermined by his players' performance. William
Gallas, who is considering his own future at the club and is wanted in Italy,
has let slip that Mourinho is prone to losing his temper, something he did
rarely in his first season in England. "If we don't play well we know that
the boss is going to shout at us and we don't want that," he said.
Robben, meanwhile, has received reassurances from the Netherlands coach Marco
van Basten, during a testy season in which his relationship with Mourinho has
become strained. The opinion at Chelsea is very much that the Dutch winger is
saving his best for the World Cup finals in June and is even less willing to
risk his fitness than he was last season. It does not help that Van Basten is
no fan of Mourinho and Robben may yet be one of those shipped out of Chelsea
this summer.
While Mourinho's relationship with the English press has soured, his lustre
even at home in Portugal has slipped. While Portuguese television still pays
extraordinary homage to their famous export - the Fulham match commentary
there began with five minutes denying any problems at Chelsea - Mourinho has
recently cancelled his popular column in a magazine produced by the daily
sport newspaper Record. He was furious that they put a line from an article
he had written criticising Benfica's coach, Ronald Koeman, on the front page.
Mourinho then submitted another column attacking the paper for doing so and
when they refused to publish it, he quit.
Despite his success, Mourinho's image back in Portugal has gradually changed,
the image of the assured man of the world from his American Express adverts
has been replaced with that of a manager in perpetual conflict with opponents
and authority. There are also suggestions that his Portuguese back-room
coaching staff have not settled in London - one of them is understood to be
moving his wife and children back to Portugal and will commute to work.
The club have defended themselves against allegations of Arnesen's influence
- and reports that he has been banned by Mourinho from the training ground -
as a "ridiculous conspiracy theory". They also say that Mourinho is satisfied
with the level of support he receives from other figures in defending his,
and his club's, reputation against growing criticism.
To Mourinho, the criticism and internal strife must seem like scant reward
for the transformation of Chelsea he has masterminded over the last 18 months.
Today will, most likely, see them take another step towards their second
Premiership title - an accomplishment that is proving far simpler for
Mourinho than consolidating his hold over a club where so many little
emperors are vying for power.
~~~
這賽季有很多事情可以討論,作為下賽季的改進目標
不過目前還是以英超為重
大家齊心協力,有千不滿萬不滿的事等結束之後再吵吧
~~~
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