Early last year, I took part in a survey to pick the 10 greatest European Cup-winning managers.
These are the names the poll came up with: Rinus Michels, Bob Paisley, Matt Busby, Ernst Happel, Alex Ferguson, Brian Clough, Bela Guttman, Arrigo Sacchi, Jock Stein and Marcello Lippi.
Jose Mourinho, along with Fabio Capello, just missed the cut. Had the poll been done months later, after his second Champions League win, Mourinho would have cruised into that top 10.
Had he gone on this year to lift his third European Cup with three different clubs, he could have laid claim to being near the top of it.
But what we witnessed in the Bernabeu on Wednesday proved that, no matter how many trophies Mourinho wins, he will never deserve to sit in such exalted company as those true Âmanagerial greats.
Because, ultimately, he doesnât really care about football. Not the players, not the fans and not the club.
He cares solely about one thing: How Jose Mourinho is perceived. How he can sneer and wink at the fools who doubt him.
And heâs turning into a sad, demented bore.
Heâs the new Michael ÂBarrymore. An eccentric, anti-establishment figure who once appeared a breath of fresh air.
When he went into exile, and blander men replaced him, we looked back on his act with Âfondness. But when he was shoved before us again, needing to go to greater lengths to shock us into loving him, we just squirmed and wondered what we ever found appealing.
Itâs why the vast majority of neutrals (despite having many issues with Barcelona) were overjoyed to see this mean-spirited figure humiliated on Wednesday.
That long, pre-Âmeditated after-match outburst, when he blamed everyone from Uefa to Unicef for conspiring to get Barca to Wembley was his way of stealing the limelight from a truly great football man, Lionel Messi, who had just scored one of the finest-ever Champions League goals.
More than that, it was a way of diverting attention away from the kind of anti-football Jorge Valdano once described as âs*** on a stickâ that he chose to serve up when he had home advantage, with the most lavishly-assembled squad in the world at his disposal.
A team that had Benzema, Higuain and Kaka on the bench, and the most expensive footballer ever, Cristiano Ronaldo pleading with his manager to give him the means to attack.
A manager who looked away, letting him know he was an irrelevance in the greater scheme of things - the scheme of elevating Jose.
Remember him holding five fingers up to the cameras after winning the FA Cup with Chelsea, reminding us how many trophies he had won in London, racing down the line at Old Trafford, running to the centre of the Nou Camp last year and dragging the cameras away from the Inter Milan players who had performed so brilliantly? Nauseating.
The self-styled Special One does not deserve to sit alongside the Happels, Paisleys and Busbys because he does not love football and football people. Just himself.
He doesnât create great clubs, just one trophy-winning team, before moving on to another rich club he believes can fuel his personal ambition.
He now tells us his next move will be to England and believes he is flattering us with such a generous pronouncement.
But is a man whose youthful charm has turned to bitter Âmegalomania, a self-obsessed control freak who plays with such destructive cynicism, really worthy of taking our biggest and best clubs forward?
In a word, no.
http://www.mirrorfootball.co.uk/opinion/columnists/brian-reade/Brian-Reade-on-Real-Madrid-Barcelona-Why-self-centred-Jose-Mourinho-is-turning-into-a-Special-bore-article729633.html
