Manchester Evening News

Jose’s surrogate family surround him at hotel base

- By CIARAN KELLY ciaran.kelly@trinitymir­ror.com @MENCKelly

THE alarm clock goes, the Bryan Adams Spotify playlist is queued up. It’s 7.45am. Let’s go.

The reception staff will be the first people he lays eyes on.

‘Morning, Jose!’ Every day. Before that unmistakab­le chauffeur pulls up in his Jaguar, opens the car door and takes him on a familiar route down the A6144 to Carrington.

It is a routine Jose Mourinho now knows only too well after 18 months at the Lowry.

The hotel that has developed a personalit­y of its own during the Portuguese’s time as United manager.

The hotel he would never have imagined one day becoming his home while staying there ahead of Soccer Aid in 2014.

Few United fans do not know where Mourinho lives. How many managers can you say that about in world football?

The Portuguese has even earned unfavourab­le comparison­s with Alan Partridge, who infamously lived at Linton Travel Tavern for 183 unforgetta­ble days.

At least the views at the Lowry are better than that of the A11 between Norwich and London.

But it is easy to forget that Mourinho threw himself into life in Manchester when he was first appointed in June 2016 and was regularly spotted strolling along Trinity Bridge with his tight-knit team of assistants to sample the delights of San Carlo and Bem Brazil.

The 54-year-old even took to watching Portugal’s Euro 2016 games in the Lowry’s hotel bar.

But Mourinho soon realised that life in Manchester city centre was not quite like it was in leafy Belgravia, where residents rarely pestered him and allowed him to go about his day.

Mourinho was mobbed and while he happily obliged – signing autographs and happily posing for selfies – he soon took to wearing hats and hoods.

There is a bizarre, voyeuristi­c intrigue surroundin­g it all. Why is Mourinho, a married father-of-two, still living alone in a hotel?

Countless outlets have wildly speculated about how much he is paying to stay – £411 per night? £694 per night? £816 per night?

All while not knowing the strictly confidenti­al details of the hotel’s arrangemen­t with United or, indeed, Mourinho’s reduced rate as part of his lengthy stay.

What few people realise is how increasing­ly common such an arrangemen­t is for globe-trotting figures in football these days.

There are some United players, for example, who live away from their partners. So is it any wonder that Mourinho has surrounded himself with a handful of people who know him best, who he can let his guard down with, who know his dry sense of humour inside out – his assistants. The Portuguese sees Rui Faria, Silvino Louro and Ricardo Formosinho more than his actual family these days. These are bonds that go back more than 15 years at a variety of clubs across Europe. Jose Morais, who worked with Mourinho at Benfica, Inter Milan, Real Madrid and in his second spell at Chelsea, is one of just a handful of coaches who have entered that privileged inner circle. “He has a kind of magic. He knows how to take care of his family and his coaching staff,” Mourinho’s former opposition scout and assistant coach previously told M.E.N. Sport. “You follow him as part of his family. “This is the way I feel and this is the way I believe that others also feel. I never saw someone else with his kind of intuition, that kind of feeling.” Clearly, it works both ways.

 ??  ?? Reds boss Jose Mourinho and, inset, entering the Lowry Hotel
Reds boss Jose Mourinho and, inset, entering the Lowry Hotel

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