Mourinho drops Terry, sees team cruise to 4-0 win
LONDON: Jose Mourinho’s selection gamble paid off as Chelsea got their spluttering season back on track with a 4-0 rout of Maccabi Tel Aviv in the Champions League on Wednesday.
Mourinho’s side went into their Group G opener in turmoil after Saturday’s dismal 3-1 defeat at Everton left them with only one win from their first five Premier League matches.
That miserable sequence was Chelsea’s worst start to a season since 1988 and it provoked a barrage of criticism for Mourinho and his under-perfor ming English champions.
But Mourinho promised changes after the Everton loss and the Blues boss was true to his word as he axed John Terry, Diego Costa, Pedro Rodriguez, John Obi Mikel, Nemanja Matic and Branislav Ivanovic.
It seemed the switches might backfire after Eden Hazard’s shocking penalty miss in the first half at Stamford Bridge.
But lacklustre Maccabi were the perfect opponents for Chelsea to rediscover a semblance of their form and Willian opened the scoring before Oscar showed Hazard how to do it by converting a penalty on the stroke of half-time.
‘GERRARD IS WRONG’ Mourinho has taken a swipe at Steven Gerrard as the Chelsea manager slammed claims of a rift with his axed captain John Terry.
LA Galaxy midfielder Gerrard, working as a television pundit for the Chelsea match, claimed Mourinho’s treatment of Terry must be due to a fracturing of their relationship.
“There’s certainly a bit of fric- tion behind the scenes because for me, you play John Terry week in, week out, he’s your captain,” Gerrard told BT Sport.
But Mourinho was quick to rubbish that suggestion.
“Steven is wrong,” Mourinho said. “I like him very much and respect him. I think he feels the same way but he is wrong because we have no problems.”
Mourinho, however, stopped short of guaranteeing the centreback would return to the team for Arsenal’s visit on Saturday.
“I don’t know. Tomorrow I will start thinking about it,” the coach said.