Jose Mourinho explained frustration got the better of him when he claimed there are problems with his Tottenham team that neither he or any coach would be able to solve.
Mourinho raised eyebrows with his post-match complaint following Spurs’s 2-1 defeat at West Ham, a fifth reverse in six league games.
Asked what he meant by the initially cryptic comment, Mourinho insisted: ‘Nothing specific, nothing that probably you think I wanted to say and I didn’t.
‘First of all, a press conference, three or four interviews, a flash interview, a couple of minutes after games … I sometimes think that we coaches are amazing guys for not to say too many … it’s better I don’t use the words … you understand me.
‘I think we have to be bright guys and in control of our emotions and not to say the wrong things because it’s never easy, especially after a defeat.
‘Sometimes there are moments of frustration and post-match interviews are the perfect place not to say the right things or to leave some things out.
‘Today, in a pre-match press conference, everything that you say you can follow word by word, because we are calm with no pressure and no adrenalin. But after matches, it is not easy for us.’
And seemingly referring to Chelsea boss Thomas Tuchel’s scathing criticism of Callum Hudson-Odoi after he subbed the England winger after only bringing him on at half-time, Mourinho added: ‘Sometimes we [managers] say things that can be controversial, we say things that people don’t understand, we can say even really bad things, which was not my case but, for example, this weekend I think one of my colleagues went a bit too far in his words but that’s another story because it’s not Jose Mourinho, that’s not a problem.
‘In relation to my words, it’s a big frustration to lose matches, especially matches like that one [at West Ham].
‘I prefer to lose playing well than playing bad but when you lose and you play bad, the feeling is just of disappointment and sometimes rage.
‘But when you play so well and you lose, you realise that there are things that are not in your hands. You hit the post twice. That ball, the new ball, I hate that new ball, white and dark blue now, the ball didn’t want to go inside [the net]. I cannot control. Probably the yellow ball will go inside.
‘We had two posts, we had lots of crosses across the face of the goal, you cannot control. The VAR of course was correct with the disallowed goal. The VAR was correct. But you are waiting for a little bit of luck and the VAR is correct. And the linesman was correct. No, it wasn’t [the break we needed]. ‘You make a mistake, beginning of second-half, boom, a goal. So there are things that you can work a lot, you can fight and you can analyse, but there are things that are out of your control.’
Mourinho says there is only one way for Spurs to turn things around in those cases when things are going against them.
He added: ‘What can you do if you have things out of your control? Work!
‘That is why after the [West Ham] game we didn't go home. We arrived at the training ground and went to analyse the West Ham game so the next session we were ready to analyse it with the players.
‘The next day we analysed the first game against Wolfsberger and you work again and split the groups. Some guys can train, others have to recover and you manage everything.
‘You speak with everybody and try to work out who is in the best condition with the sports science and the medical guys. We work a lot in this building. And sometimes we feel the frustration.’
Source: m.allfootballapp.com