…they pull me back in!”
The immortal words of Michael Corleone in the final glorious installment of The Godfather, Part III.
Just as I`ve published my first more or less unreservedly positive article about Chelsea going forward, just I let go of my sheer fury at the asinine loss of our greatest ever manager, up pops that guy.
You know that guy: the one who has to have the last word however wrong or misguided just for the sake of, well, having the last word.
And of course, no true blue with communications skills can let those skills lie idle and allow such a thing.
Particularly when those last words purport to put our greatest ever manager`s Chelsea career into context but actually just embarrass.
So, two “last word on Mourinho” pieces in the past week, one basically hanging everything on the words of self-appointed unofficial team spokesman Jon Obi Mikel, the other damning Chelsea`s greatest ever manager for his public falling out with the female physio and publicly blaming players for bad results – oh and disappointment at José`s all-around “bizarre behavior” in post-match interviews.
Both pieces, by the way, acknowledging José Mourinho`s status as winner, Chelsea legend, Chelsea`s greatest ever manager, etc.
The mind boggles.
First of all, let`s flick away the ‘substance` of the pieces: Mikel has been saying to whatever paper Abramenalo can get to listen, that Guus Hiddink treats the players like grown-ups, isn’t nosy, sorts trouble out straight away in the open and even manages to keep Diego Costa in a good mood when, quote, (this one from The Telegraph) “It takes a lot to keep Diego in a good mood!”
Way to throw your team-mate under the bus, Jon Obi!
The most interesting thing about that by a country mile to a reporter looking for a real story is that there`s major unhappiness in the Chelsea dressing-room – who knew?
The saddest thing is reading this ‘writer` – a so-called Chelsea fan – joining Abramenalo in trying to twist the words of Mikel – one of José Mourinho`s most loyal disciples, a guy he fought tooth and claw to keep – into criticism of José.
Mikel, a hero of Munich 2012, is a quiet and staunch fellow who adores José.
He is a straight and equitable team leader who is perfectly happy accentuating the new manager`s many positives.
Mikel`s words cast zero light on José`s tenure – if anything they make you wonder how, if things are soooo much better under Guus, Chelsea have leapt a whole, er, one place in the table since Mourinho`s departure some three months ago.
Moving on.
The other piece – in which well over the first half is spent lavishing praise on Mourinho and making a good case for precisely why he should still be at Chelsea`s helm – puts most of the bad eggs in the Eva Carneiro basket.
Having always adored Mourinho, the fiery Portuguese became a villain in this ‘writer`s` eyes the moment he publicly harangued the popular female physio for unilaterally trying to cost Chelsea a game by running on to the filed to minister to a prostrate Eden Hazard thus cutting the team down to nine players.
So just let me get this straight: Chelsea`s most successful ever manager, a man you both have huge affection for and admire, becomes a hate figure on the turn of a single, and the ‘writer` himself admits highly confusing, event.
At least the ‘writer` does us the service of acknowledging that the entire Eva episode – as so much of that nightmare early season – was shrouded in mystery: why did the whole thing go so nuclear? Why was Dr Eva hounded out? Was there some deeper Hazard involvement? Who knows?
Well, clearly this ‘writer` does because he claims he could never look at José the same way again.
Sheesh! With admirers like you matey, who needs enemies?!
We then learn that this ‘writer`s` Dr Eva-inspired instant hatred for José further inspires him to interpret José`s increasingly frank and emotional post-match interviews as by turn disloyal, selfish and bizarre.
Hmmm.
Once you`ve made the leap of deciding that José was 100% unilaterally in the wrong and a bad person forever over Dr. Eva, I guess you would begin to look at everything through the same baleful lens.
Because the Chelsea faithful – whose opinions this writer amalgamates on a near daily basis – had a quite different view of José`s post-match appearances.
Almost universally, what the faithful saw was a winner willing to go to any lengths to fight and over-turn a club-wide acceptance of mediocrity – if those lengths should even include going against his most dearly held principles – such as calling out a recalcitrant player in public for the good of the team, so be it.
Mourinho simply could not compute how a champion club could be willing to settle for less than becoming champions again – something they crystal-clearly and categorically did when they denied their champion manager his transfer requests back on April 26th 2015.
One of the aforementioned ‘writers` unwittingly, hilariously, confirms José`s predicament by claiming that the 2014/15 squad couldn’t hold a candle to the Premiership double-winners of Mourinho`s previous tenure.
Precisely, matey!
That`s precisely why José wanted to tool up before this season!
For many laptop warriors something like being prevented to sign necessary reinforcements might seem annoying – for a perfectionist, genius and winner like Mourinho it was the end of the world.
As everybody avows, José Mourinho is one in a billion – for all kinds of reasons good and bad.
Usually good and bad mixed together: the über-passion that makes him charge up the touchline with unbounded joy as his team scores is the same passion that makes him explode perhaps irrationally at a physio.
Do we understand it? We try. Do we condone it? Er? kind of, because we don’t want to throw the baby (guaranteed championship football) out with the bath-water (a non football-related issue).
Do we want a potential sexist bully as our manager? Er, we`d rather not, but this is the first instance of anything like that and it was in the heat of the moment, though because he`s big baby in so many ways he probably won`t ever say sorry and it`s probably all bound up in his MASSIVE passion for winning rather than any sexism and he IS a winner and handling women isn’t really THAT big a part of the job?
In other words, for a True Blue, the Dr. Eva thing was a regrettable moment, part of the José persona, moving on.
But you want to make THAT your line in the sand!
Are you actually a Chelsea supporter at all?
Or are you one of those that also hates John Terry because you think he`s a racist?
Did you have the same “I can never look at him the same way again” moment after JT`s ‘infamous mistake`?
Enemies of Chelsea permanently brand our captain, leader and legend a racist, even though he came through Senrab in Ilford, Essex as a kid, where most of the players were black.
Hmmmm, must have been hard for this alleged racist to hold his nose so to speak as he performed so brilliantly alongside so many people he had contempt for.
Of course JT isn’t racist!
Did he make a racist remark in the heat of battle against an opponent? It seems so.
Was that remark inculcated by a childhood surrounded by people using such remarks until they were just a part of JT`s life soundtrack? Probably.
Was Rio Ferdinand not only JT`s rival at Man United but also rival for the England centre-back position? Yes. Do we think that that rather than race or family ties made Ferdinand so outspoken against JT? Have any of the other black or non-white players JT has played alongside as brothers ever complained that JT is a racist? No.
The entire JT-Anton Ferdinand affair was not a black and white issue but it certainly was a tribal issue.
At the heart of it was the Chelsea Tribe v the local rival QPR Tribe; then there was the Ferdinand Tribe and the Man United Tribe; finally, and most damaging for JT, in came the Politically-Correct Media Tribe (The Guardian etc) and the FA Tribe (oh, and by the way, that`s where the FA Tribe first turned against the Chelsea Tribe).
When José snapped at Dr Eva, that Media Tribe came out swinging for the Chelsea Tribe again as it loves to do, and so did all the other tribes from all the other teams.
BUT NOT OUR TRIBE!
NEVER OURS!
We are the Chelsea and we are the best! We are the Chelsea and **** all the rest!
That`s how it goes, plastics: we stick together!
Those ain`t just words, they mean something and stand for something.
One of the above ‘writers` recently wrote a would-be satirical piece on here about my allegedly proscriptive opinions regarding what it takes to be a true Chelsea supporter.
Well, listen up, Blue Muppet or whatever you call yourself, here`s a cast-iron rule about being a true Chelsea fan, memorise it matey: WE STICK TOGETHER.
WE.
STICK.
TOGETHER.
We don’t turn against one of our own hugest legends the first Premiership game of the season after he brought us an unique double just because he makes a stupid mistake.
He may have been a rash and stupid and combustible man, but he`s OUR rash and stupid and combustible man!
We are the Chelsea and we are the best! We are the Chelsea and **** all the rest!
We let other teams worry about our manager because we don’t – he`s one of us.
The truly unfortunate and unhinging thing about the disloyal glory-hunting plastics, as we can see from the ‘writers` above, is that from day one of the season – literally – their inability to behave like proper Chelsea fans gave encouragement to Mourinho`s enemies.
While things like the Dr Eva unpleasantness would have been handled by other big clubs with an arm around the manager`s shoulder, a stern word in his ear and an order to apologize publicly and immediately, the CFC “rats” both allowed a politically clueless Mourinho to embroil himself in the nonsense further and deeper and meanwhile fanned the Media Tribe (Politically Correct and otherwise) to keep the episode going.
(All while Mourinho was struggling to galvanize an overweight, knackered group, demotivated by the lack of promised reinforcements, to put their best foot forward for another season.)
While the last thing I am is a fan of the hateful Reds, check out what they did when their manager fell foul of not just an individual, but England`s most influential institution, the BBC: they ignored it and allowed it to fade away.
I wonder how many Reds fans there were whining about how they hated Ferguson insulting the British establishment?
I tell you how many: zero, that`s how many.
So please, do us all a favour: spare us your explanations of your threadbare Chelsea fandom and just cross your fingers along with the rest of us that something bizarre and wonderful happens to stop Abramenalo`s December Disaster haunting us from the proximity of Old Trafford for years to come.
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