The Mourinho Paradox
The lingering question of entertainment surrounding Jose’s United ramps up the stakes in Saturday’s FA Cup final
It was a piece of pure Jose Mourinho theatre.
“I think it’s my fault, because people are used to my teams getting good results and winning titles,” said Mourinho last October to his usual crowded press room.
“Other people have more time than I have. Other people have different standards than I have and that’s not a problem for me at all.”
Here was one of football’s biggest personalities at his peak, chest puffed out as he proffered his pointed soliloquy. First came the apology for being too good, a wonderful utterance of false modesty. Then came the barb at his peers. We guessed which rival was being skewered this time - Jurgen Klopp, Arsene Wenger, Mauricio Pochettino? It wasn’t important; anyone but Mourinho was all that mattered.
Mourinho is right - he is judged by different standards. Those October words came after Manchester United’s negative approach had been questioned by reporters, but United had just extended their unbeaten run at the start of the season to 12 matches. They were two points from the top of the Premier League and had won all three of their Champions League group stage games. There was no disaster brewing.
But Mourinho also demands to be judged by different standards and must accept that role. Everything about Mourinho pertains to him being a winner. Every action is calculated, every inaction too. His Machiavellian persona epitomises the obsession in one thing: finishing first. When you display such naked desire to win, finishing second is easily sold as failure.
If Mourinho had his way, it would all be about winning. That is why he struggled to countenance what he saw as mawkish praise for the beautiful football played by Arsene Wenger’s Arsenal and Pep Guardiola’s Barcelona, and why he took such pleasure in beating both with Chelsea and Real Madrid. What could be more beautiful than a sense of achievement?
“Only a few days ago someone called me a coach who wins titles and not football,” he said in 2011 when coach of Real Madrid.
“Thank you - I like being a coach who wins titles.”
Here lies the great paradox of Jose Mourinho. He prioritises winning far above aesthetics and style, and yet the accusation of being a defensive coach still gnaws away at him. For a man who insists on focusing on the final destination, he spends an awful lot of time defending the journey.
That is partly because Mourinho - like anyone -wants to be liked and wants his own supporters to cherish him, but also because he understands the growing role that style plays in a manager’s reputation. Winning and entertainment are not mutually exclusive - Guardiola’s Manchester City have proved that - but they are certainly mutually beneficial to one another. Mourinho might hate the concept, but finishing second with style affords greater goodwill than stumbling in the right direction.
The problem with Mourinho’s second season at Old Trafford is that he has managed neither glory nor entertainment. The criticism of Manchester United’s results has been slightly overplayed - barring the defeats to West Brom and Huddersfield and Champions League exit to Sevilla - but the sluggish and compartmentalised nature of their attacking play is the defining characteristic of their Premier League season.
United have created 377 chances in the league; no other top-six team has created fewer than 445. Given the investment in Romelu Lukaku - too often left isolated - Alexis Sanchez and Paul Pogba, along with Marcus Rashford, Anthony Martial, Henrikh Mkhitaryan, Jesse Lingard and Juan Mata, that falls well short of expectation.
The suspicion, even from Mourinho’s own supporters, is that it is David de Gea who has saved this Manchester United campaign, not him. They have allowed more shots on their goal than Watford. A team that cannot click in attack almost two years into Mourinho’s reign also fails to protect their goalkeeper.
If these are questions that will be repeated over the summer and into next season, on Saturday Mourinho gets to turn down the volume. At Wembley, the talk of style and flair is silenced for two hours. This is Mourinho in his element. When everything else is stripped away, and we are left with a one-off contest in which winner takes all, only winning matters.
Beat Chelsea and lift the FA Cup, and no supporter or journalist will care too much about the performance. The only lasting image is of a captain lifting the old trophy above his head. Given that premise, it is no surprise that Mourinho is a man of finals. Since taking FC Porto to the UEFA Cup final in 2003, he has won 12 of his 14 finals as a manager at five different clubs.
The strength of Mourinho’s personality dictates that he will always be under pressure. No other manager places themselves so deliberately at the front and centre of a team’s fortunes. Few other people in the sport lift their head quite as high above the parapet.
Against his former employers on Saturday, Mourinho will label himself a winner yet again. Fail against last season’s champions as he has against this season’s in the Premier League, and there will be a queue of those waiting to celebrate his failure. Manchester United’s season hangs on this; so does Mourinho’s.
The Goal Pressure Index is presented by Sure and powered by Opta data, providing the first ever system to measure and rate a team and player’s performance under pressure. The Goal Pressure Index uses more than 750,000 data points to calculate a rating out of 100 for every Premier League player every week. Sure is also an Official Partner of Chelsea FC, Everton FC and Southampton FC.
