Defiant Jose Mourinho stands his ground against critics in Chelsea medical staff row

Jose Mourinho was in defiant mood at his press conference

WHETHER it was the bags under his eyes or the combo of flip-flops and socks, suddenly Jose Mourinho did not look quite so special after all.

 

His damp hair clung to his head and he somehow seemed smaller than usual, hidden behind the huge desk at the front of the wood-panelled room

For a week his graceless handling of a perceived problem with his medical staff has been called into question and today was his heavily-trailed time to face the music.

His decision to remove Dr Eva Carneiro from her touchline duties over her handling of Eden Hazard’s injury during Saturday’s game against Swansea had dominated the papers for most of the week and it was no surprise to find the club’s surprisingly small media theatre at its Cobham training ground packed well before the allotted time for the press conference.

“Busier than even a Champions League game,” said club stalwart Brian, busily handing out the coffees to media friends and strangers alike.

 

Three minutes early, the side door opened and Mourinho shuffled rather than strode to his usual seat in front of the microphones and spotlights.

The club’s head of communications had alerted the room that Mourinho would make a few opening observations but was unlikely to take any further questions from the floor on a matter that was an “internal staff matter”.

First he questioned the ghoulish right of many of the reporters even to be in the room.

“Look, I hope this room is full because the champions are going to play against the former champion, because the transfer window was on fire in the last period of the transfer window, because you have hopefully, a big match on Sunday,” he said. 

“But I knew it already, it wasn’t a surprise your question. And probably there are some people here who don’t even like football and they come just for other reasons.

 

“But I don’t want to run away from it, not even being critic of you, because of your question. I accept the question and I understand the question.”

The only problem was he was in no mood to answer it. The main bones of his explanation can be found here but the key points remained unsaid.

But he refused to accept he was wrong to suggest a manager’s wishes should supplant a request for medical attention from a player.

And there was no regret at an abhorrent outburst against two silent members of his staff the previous week which has now been repeated all around the world.

“Sorry” was not so much the hardest – simply a wholly unconsidered one in Mourinho’s self-regarding world.