PREMIER LEAGUE MANCHESTER BRAWL OR
Swans boss: Jose likes confrontation...
CARLOS CARVALHAL used to pick the brains of Jose Mourinho, but you won’t find him picking a fight.
The two Portuguese managers bump heads on Saturday when Carvalhal takes his resurgent Swansea City team to Old Trafford – The Seething One hosting The Smiler.
At 52, Carvalhal is only three years younger than Mourinho, but their careers have been on different trajectories.
The Manchester United boss has long been one of the Premier League’s big fish while, to borrow one of Carvalhal’s favoured analogies, the Swan is more of a sardine.
Carvalhal – who spent time shadowing Mourinho when his compatriot was at Chelsea – says they are chalk and cheese in temperament, but they do share more than nationality, including a protective self-belief.
“If a club sacks me one day, the next morning, I feel sorry for them because they have lost a good manager,” said Carvalhal.
“My background is strong, in knowledge – in both theory and practice. I know I have experience and I’m completely ready for everything.
“I like Mourinho and he knows that I like him. I studied him. I spent a week at Manchester United when Alex Ferguson was there, then a week watching Mourinho at Chelsea. I also went to Real Madrid.
“I tried to learn with the best. He has a big self-confidence like I do. You need that. But he is a completely different personality.
“He likes confrontation. He likes to fight with people. And he’s very good when he is fighting.
“I am completely different. I like to keep far away from the fight. I like to win, but if someone tries to fight with me, they will find they are fighting with themselves.” Rather than fight people, Carvalhal prefers to fight things – like t he odds a nd relegation, both of which he seems to be beating, having taken the Swans from bottom of the table to 14th on the strength of five wins and three draws in 10 matches.
Where Mourinho now rages in 12- minute tirades at Press conferences, Carvalhal hands out dainty pastries from his homeland, along with homespun philosophy featuring seafood or stories about his tailor.
But he believes he has sometimes been wrongly accused of scrapping when he is talking – a misunderstanding that has led him into occasional trouble with referees, just like Mourinho. He TRY telling Carlos Carvalhal he’s got it tough keeping Swansea in the Premier League and he’ll give a one-word reply that begins with B and ends with an S – Besiktas.
Carvalhal had already gone through 13 clubs when he arrived in Istanbul in 2011, but he learned how to manage at Besiktas.
“It wasn’t easy,” he says. “It was a different language in a different country, working with a staff that wasn’t mine, the previous manager was put in jail, the club was without a board, and no one was being paid for four months.
“I could write a book about my time in Istanbul, even though I was only there one said: “We like to use our hands a lot – and the referees ees don’t like it. But we Portuguese se talk a lot with our hands and it makes people think we are doing ng something very wrong.
“Now, I stand with my hands ds in my pockets. I must protect myself. yself. Otherwise people think I’m out ut of control when I’m not.”
Sacked by Sheffield Wednesday sday in December, despite taking them hem to the Championship play-offs ffs in successive seasons, Carvalhal l will try to increase Mourinho’s troubles ubles by adding United to a list of recent ecent scalps that includes Liverpool l and Arsenal.
Secrets
MourinhoM has big self-confidence. He likes to fight with people. And he is very good when he is fighting
Swansea lost 4-0 at home to United back in August and 2-0 - 0 in the League Cup in October. r.
But that was before King ng Carlos – the Welsh wordsmith mith warrior – took to the throne and he is clearly ready for the last laugh augh with Mourinho.
“It will be an interesting game at Manchester United,” he added. dded. “But it will be one of our hardest dest games of the season.
“I am sure we will talk, alk, absolutely. He will smile and nd make some jokes to me in private. He likes to do that and nd he’s a funny guy.
“But there is no co-operative ve feeling among Portuguese se managers. We tend not to share re our secrets.”