UNITED CHIEF GOT WHAT HE PAID FOR IN SHOCK-JOCK MOURINHO
Ed Woodward really shouldn’t be surprised. He got what he paid for...
IT would be wrong to confer too much importance on the actions of fans who hire planes to fly protest banners over football stadiums but it feels instructive to recall that, when Arsenal supporters wanted to demonstrate their unease about the direction their club was taking, they chose their greatest ever manager, Arsene Wenger, not their chief executive Ivan Gazidis, as the object of their sky-high ire.
When Manchester United fans attempt a similar stunt ahead of the game against Burnley next Sunday, the club’s manager, Jose Mourinho, will not be the headline act.
Wenger never complained about the money he was given to spend but Mourinho is not like that and so it is Ed Woodward, United’s executive vice-chairman, who will take the flak, even though he has given him hundreds of millions of pounds for new arrivals.
That Mourinho would play this game with Woodward at some point
SKINS games in golf have often had a nostalgic feel to them down the decades but the fact that a broadcaster is throwing $9 million (£7m) at Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson for a winner-takes-all showdown in Las Vegas in November is redolent of a sport reluctant to embrace a new era. Golf, like tennis, is still dominated by living legends deep into the autumns of their careers. In tennis, the new breed has been unable to dislodge Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal and the dynamic is similar in golf. The best rivalry is deemed not to be Rory McIlroy and Jordan Spieth or Brooks Koepka and Dustin Johnson but Woods and Mickelson. This is a sporting era where nostalgia is now. was eminently predictable. Woodward is a smart man. When he appointed Mourinho, he must have known what he was getting. Everyone else did. He was getting a shock jock. Not an empire builder. He was getting short term. Not long term. He was getting four years. Maximum.
He was getting a guy who comes in, wows a club with his charisma and his record, alienates all but the fans of the club he is managing, picks fights, makes enemies, makes it all about him, takes flight on a magic- carpet ride of unbridled narcissism, lives for the now, stifles attacking football and attacking footballers, plays it for the short term and moves on.
He was getting a manager who descends into a fog of discord, who has a habit of turning his relationship with his own club into one bloody battle after another.
Exhibit A here is t he needless, vituperative, vindictive fall- out with Eva Carneiro in Chelsea’s first game of the 2015-16 season. By the time Mourinho was sacked that December, Chelsea were in 16th place. Now, with this season only two games old, we are back in the maelstrom that is Mourinho’s natural habitat. Now, he is simmering and sullen and boiling with resentments, aiming withering sarcasm at TV reporters, serving up withering answers in press conferences. Watching him implode is like watching a movie on a l o o p: t he s a me t hi ng happens time after time after time. Sure this season is in its infancy and, starting with tomorrow’s clash with Spurs at Old Trafford, things may yet improve. Tottenham have a rotten record in Stretford and their boss, Mauricio Pochettino, has been to Old Trafford four times in the league and never once seen his team score or pick up a point.
A win for United against Spurs, a team perceived to be full of the vitality and togetherness that United lack, would be a fillip for Mourinho. But the worry for the United hierarchy is that their manager is starting to draw patterns that presage more and more problems.
All the signs are there: internal squabbles with Woodward, issues with t al ented but headstrong individual players such as Paul Pogba and Anthony Martial and antipathy towards the media. On Friday, he turned up for his press conference at Carrington half an hour early and then answered broadcasters’ questions for 259 seconds.
Even those who did not miss the conference altogether were treated to terse, tense answers. Yeah, I know. Boo-hoo. The media set-up at Old Trafford has been amateur hour for some time now and a few sports reporters missing a press conference is hardly the end of the world.
But that is not the point. The point is that when Mourinho starts to act like this, it is usually all over by Christmas. He knew t hat by starting the conference early, he would generate another cycle of negative headlines. He and United are stuck in a spiral of antagonism and the constant conflict appears to be sapping their energy while Manchester City and Liverpool ride waves of positivity.
IT is hard not to feel some sympathy for Woodward. He is clearly an extremely smart commercial operator who has been a generous benefactor to Mourinho. But he is discovering the kind of operator he is up against. It was a big call to balk at Mourinho’s wish-list in the summer transfer window and Mourinho has not reacted well to it.
As Gary Neville pointed out last week, Woodward’s withdrawal of financial backing for Mourinho came at a curious time. If you are in, you have to be in all the way. The way Woodward has acted, it looks as if he and the board have lost confidence in the manager.
The problem for Woodward is t hat Mourinho is j us t bei ng Mourinho. There are only two games of the season gone but already it is beginning to feel like the dawn of his tumultuous final season at Chelsea in 2015-16, when he became stuck in a cycle of despondency and aggravation.
This is how it always plays out with him. Woodward must have known that. Everyone else did. There is no point trying to change Mourinho because he does not know any other way. Either you keep backing him, either you keep faith in the philosophy you bought into when you appointed him, or you get rid of him.
Either you ride with him all the way i nto his world of eternal conflict or you look for someone else. When you appoint Mourinho, don’t be surprised when he’s not Guardiola. Don’t be surprised when he’s not Klopp. Or Pochettino. When you s i gn Mourinho, don’t be surprised when you don’t get beautiful football every week.
Don’t be surprised when your club looks like it’s stuck in a time warp. Don’t be surprised if your popularity goes down the tubes and if fans hire planes to fly banners over stadiums calling for you to be fired. Woodward gave Mourinho a new contract earlier this year. He is getting what he paid for.