The Special One will need a miracle in the return leg of the Champions League fixture with Barcelona and trailing by two away goals a trip to the Gaudi’s La Sagrada Familia cathedral just down the road from Camp Nou may not be enough – unless Real Madrid can produce a miracle. Despite an impressive record in the Champions League in recent years following wins with Porto and Inter Milan, and laying the groundwork for Chelsea to reach the final in 2008, Jose Mourinho may have been undone on Wednesday night at the Estadio Santiago Bernabeu by his own mind games and obstinate self belief.
The Real team of this season does not enjoy the same skilled back four that helped Inter win the trophy last season where the experience of Lucio, athleticism of Maicon, doggedness of Milito and Cambiasso established the platform for the Mourinho Method. Although Madrid possess midfielders in abundance and attacking flair, the success of all Mourinho teams has been a rock solid defense, all at the sacrifice of style and beauty when needed. It is an element that undid Celtic in the Cup winner's cup final in Sevilla some years ago, was the feature of the Double winning Chelsea team in 2005 where John Terry directed operations, and of his Italian side last year that beat Bayern in the final – and Barcelona in the semi-final with Messi nullified completely.
Albeit it the team also benefited from the skills, dead ball wizardry and sheer industry of Wesley Sneijder who has a work rate that few can match.
Despite a season of records at Real Madrid with lengthy unbeaten runs in la Liga and the lowest goals conceded in the Champions League Mourinho has failed to shore up the back four at the Bernabeu with the combination of Sergio Ramos, Pepe, Carvalho and Marcelo being the most consistent. However, in many a game the slowing Ricardo Carvalho has been found wanting, the galloping runs of Ramos come at a price of red cards and free kicks as he too often has to race back into position, with Pepe always too eager to commit and falling to stay on his feet, and Marcelo relying on his speed to overcome some of his defensive frailties. Against Barcelona the proven formation saw two changes as Carvalho was suspended and Pepe was pushed forward to crowd out the midfield and watch out for Lionel Messi when he made his moves on the edge of the box.
In the end the tactic failed as two moments of individual magic from the diminutive Argentina Maestro, Lionel Messi, were enough to give the visiting Barcelona a two goal cushion as Madrid were unable to deliver service to their strike force, even when Adebayor replaced Oezil in the second-half.
Indeed for the most of the game Cristiano Ronaldo was too deep for the ball as Real found it increasingly difficult to reclaim possession from Barcelona, and when they did so the natural pressing game of Pep Guardiola’s charges was successfully delivered through Pedro, Xavi, Sergio Busquets and Keita making it very arduous for the Madrid playmakers to establish any offensive rhythm. As the game wore it soon looked like the home side were in red and blue, with the visitors in all white strip desperately seeking a draw. Unused during the ninety minutes were the strike force of Karim Benzema, Kaka and Gonzalo Higuain. Begging the question as to what was Mourinho’s master plan?
In a niggly match filled with superfluous simulation, badly judged tackles and much ill-will, Mourinho set another record as for the third time in four encounters this season with Barcelona his team finished the game with only ten men. Last November in the first of the seasons’ “El Clasico’s” it was Sergio Ramos who took the early shower in the Camp Nou, the La Liga encounter last week it was Albiol and then Pepe in the Champions League first leg this week. Whatever the measure of this Real Madrid team, trying to beat Barcelona with ten men is nigh on impossible as the results clearly show, as the La Liga was a scrambled draw at home, they were hammered 5-0 in the first Clasico away and then lost by two goals in the Champions League on home soil.
In the Copa del Rey final however, a week before the match this week, with eleven players on the field, Madrid managed to beat Barcelona 1-0, thanks to a header from Ronaldo.
Although Mourinho claimed, tongue in cheek, in one pre-match press conferences that the Real Madrid team train as ten men ahead of each Barcelona fixture, it is clear that it is not a formula for success. Nor does it offer an attractive sporting spectacle. Indeed, the legacy of this Champions League semi final first leg will not be a good one and for different reasons to the one sided affair on Tuesday night at the Veltins Arena when Schalke-04 surrendered meekly to the power of Manchester United.
As with all his pre-match mind games, Jose Mourinho inevitably over indulges prior to all his big games and this time he may have just over cooked things. Not only for Guardiola, who clearly took exception to some of the build up, but also for Real Madrid who played on the night with a sense of restriction and burden that did not suit the players it appeared – particularly Ronaldo. The fact it did not bring the right result either will now reignite the doubts whether the Mourinho Method fits with the heritage of Real Madrid as this season looks set to finish with only the Copa del Rey in the trophy cabinet – albeit after a 17 year wait
The omens were not good prior to that final anyway with Alfredo di Stefano letting lose a broadside as to the style of play adopted by The Special One ahead of the match in Valencia, and the win may have only silenced the critics momentarily. When the trophy was squashed under the bus during the victory parade in Madrid in the early hours of Thursday morning the signs did not look any better either. Nor did the images of Mourinho ejected from the side line in the semi-final on Wednesday night at the Bernabeu, help his support amongst his detractors within the club.
No doubt the marketing guru’s at Real Madrid will now have worries too over the coming days as they try to keep sponsors and faced with another season in which Barcelona will win La Liga – and could also very well reclaim the Champions League at Wembley in May, which they last won in 2009. On the footballing side, Jorge Valdano, Real Madrid General Manager, will no doubt resurrect his concerns about Mourinho with club President Florentino Perez, only adding to the sense of isolation for the manager – an environment in which he consistently seems to revel wherever he works.
In the short term though there is a La Liga fixture at the weekend, followed by Tuesday’s visit to Camp Nou for the second leg, with Guardiola expecting the return of a number of players and Mourinho fielding a side without Sergio Ramos, for a second yellow card and Pepe for the red card. Having lost to Jose Mourinho’s Inter Milan side last year at the same stage - beaten over two legs - Guardiola will be keen to settle the score on the field of play. The feigned animosity so cultivated by Mourinho may be drowned out on the larger Barcelona pitch, which allows for the football style so embedded by Johan Cruyff over the decades at the club, with the return of Andres Iniesta surely adding further to Guardiola’s armoury.
In contrast Mourinho returns to a stadium where he worked for a short time under the late Sir Bobby Robson and a place he has courted much controversy over the years in the Champions League. Not least during the reign of Frank Rijkaard when he arrived with Chelsea in match that ended rather nastily after Mourinho accused Barcelona boss Frank Rijkaard of going into referee Anders Frisk's room at half-time during the Champions League clash in 2005, in which Didier Drogba was controversially sent off. At the time his remarks earned him a two-match touchline ban. Frisk, meanwhile, was hounded into an early retirement.
One would hope that the enforced post match media silence imposed by UEFA after the first leg will be a salutary reminder to all that the primary interest should be football and the on field behaviour. What passed in the first leg over the ninety minutes seemed to lose sight of that fact and Mourinho needs to remember that priority if e is to have any chance at Camp Nou on Tuesday. So he must unleash his team to play football.
If he is any doubt all he needs to do is remember the deft touches of Lionel Messi at the Bernabeu that proved Real Madrid’s undoing and offered two memorable moments in an otherwise turgid a Champions League semi-final as there has ever been.
Thanks Lionel for those two beautiful moments!
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