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Love him or hate him . . . you can’t beat him!

Jose Mourinho spoke directly to Chelsea supporters last week via Chelsea TV. He responded to a week when his name has been the subject of much speculation in the media over his future (Thanks to Chelsea FC official website).

Here is his message in full:

We all love Chelsea. The fans love Chelsea for a long, long time. I love Chelsea just for two-and-a-half years but I love Chelsea. I want to give my best to Chelsea every day and I want to win always the next game and the next game is against Wigan. We have to be together to win that game. We have to forget the stories, we have to forget what the press is saying and we have to concentrate on our Chelsea because Chelsea belongs to all of us.

It is easy for me. I don’t change my mind. I am focused on my job and I try always hard to motivate people around me. I’m self-motivated, always at the top. I want to win and if results are not what we want, that is even a bigger motivation to fight. For me, no problem. I don’t read the stories but I know about them because people tell me. Of course the echo arrives. But I am cool and I am not important, the club is important.

I love Chelsea as much as you all do. I want Chelsea to succeed like you supporters do but I am not just a supporter. I am a supporter and a manager so you can imagine how much I want to succeed. The word I am using in my difficult English is, I think, the correct word. We are surviving. We are not improving, we are not playing especially good. We are not getting the best results. We are getting good enough results to survive. We are waiting for better days and we are chasing that. The medical department is trying its best to recover the possible players to recover. They cannot do miracles.

I cannot do miracles as a coach. The players do their best in the positions they are playing and in the situations they are involved in at the time. We are in every competition with chances to succeed and the morale is positive. We look forward to the game tomorrow and hope we can win the points. I know the reasons why. In this moment, we are the opposite of what we were before. Before we were a team that was feeling very comfortable defending so when you score and you are in the lead, you know the game is in the pocket and you feel very comfortable defending a result.

In this moment, it is exactly the opposite. We are not strong defensively so when we are winning and the opponent is in a risky situation, attacking a lot, we are not very solid at that time. I was happy with the game at Villa because it was an answer in that respect. The team now is defending up because we have no power to defend back. We are defending up the field with a fast defensive line. That is the best way to do it because the defensive players are fast. We are trying to fight what we don’t have at this time and what we don’t have is that solid, strong defence – powerful in the air, strong in the box. So we have to play with the ammunition we have.

My future is not important. In this moment, everybody should think about the club and not about himself. I say the same to the players: it’s not important if you play, if you don’t play, if you are on the bench, if you are in the line-up, if you play two minutes, if you play 90 minutes. The important thing is that everybody gives the maximum for the club. I am a club man and I have learned to love the club for the last two and a half years. So today we won, everybody is happy. I think I will love Chelsea forever – I cannot separate my story from Chelsea’s story.

Jose is generally depicted as the bad boy of the Premiership. Surprisingly, there were quite a number of soccer personalities from EPL, who wanted Jose to stay. Some of them are below:

Manchester United manager Sir Alex Ferguson said:

I would be disappointed if he was leaving. I have enjoyed his company in the times we meet after the game and things like that. He has a good personality and I enjoy the competition against him.

May be it is a case of mutual admiration between them. Even Jose holds Sir Alex in very high regard despite all their on-field and off-field rivalry.

Fulham boss Chris Coleman added:

You will only see how big a loss Jose is after he has gone. He has won back-to-back titles, won the Carling Cup, reached the semi-finals of the Champions League. That is why any successor has to be better. If they do not better that, it is a backward step for Chelsea.

Newcastle boss Glenn Roeder said it would be a ‘great loss to the Premiership’ if Mourinho left:

I am sure the big one he wants is the Champions League, that is probably the only one that would really, really satisfy Jose Mourinho. He has worked hard to get into the position he is in and he is fortunate to have a squad of players lots of other managers would die for.

John Terry wants to retain Jose in Chelsea at any cost. He does not mince words in explaining to what extent he would go to keep his boss with his team:

We don’t want Jose to go and if it takes five or six of the senior players to tell them so, then that’s what we’re prepared to do. We are all loyal to Jose but this is putting pressure on everyone.

Drogba, enjoying his career-defining season, is desparate to repay his boss. Drogba was Jose’s signing and he stood by Drogba in his initial two years of not-so-great seasons:

Losing him will be extremely painful, it’s not easy losing a good friend. I don’t know if it will happen but if it’s true it is very sad. Stories keep cropping up but hopfully he’ll stay. Jose has built a culture that has become Chelsea’s. We’re in love with his style of coaching and the confidence he has infused into the team. I just hope people give us and the boss a break about this talk because it’s not good for the team.

Arjen Robben too sings the Jose song:

We have a great manger, he is a great professional so all the speculation, I think he can handle it. We love to have him here at Chelsea. He knows that and he deserves the songs by the crowd.

This is what I want to say about the current situation:

Jose should stay, whether we win anything this season or not. He is one of the best football managers in the world. He deserves a challenge like Chelsea and a fantastic team like Chelsea deserves a brilliant and colourful character like Jose. His priceless contribution is the winning mentality and the never-say-die spirit that you could see in the team. The most striking quality I like in Jose is his emotions and sense of humour and he uses them to telling effect.

To manage this Chelsea team owned by Roman is a huge challenge. I dont want to name them, but some of the finest managers may not be able to cope up with the expectations here. Jose has delivered two titles in two years and we all know we can expect lot more.

In all fairness, if Roman does not want to spend any money this January, it’s up to him, it’s after all his club. On the other hand, it is Jose’s team and Roman should not have any say in the football management. Simply put, the club is Roman’s and the team is Jose’s.

Jose has the support of players and fans. Not very often the fans sing the name of the club manager. I’m sure he has the support of the club management too. May be, it could all be due to a communication gap. I hope things will be allright soon. But I can’t help but wish that this is all part of Jose’s game!

The fact remains guys, a winning streak with loads of goals will completely change the scenario and Press will have something else more interesting to report, such as the collapse of Manchester United’s lead!

[tags] Chelsea, Jose, Mourinho, Jose Mourinho, Roman, Abramovich, Roman Abramovich, John Terry, Drogba, Robben, Alex Ferguson [/tags]

Thanks to gettyimages for the picture