José Mourinho’s agent, Jorge Mendes, has described the Portuguese as “the best coach in the world”.
“José Mourinho does not stop being who he is despite leaving Chelsea,” Mendes told the Portuguese newspaper A Bola. “When Mourinho left Chelsea the first time, he accepted a tremendous challenge and did what no one in the football world believed he could do and that was to take on Inter and lead them to win the Champions League, Serie A and Coppa Italia, a truly remarkable achievement.
“Then he went to Real Madrid and inspired an historic achievement of the Spanish league, beating all possible records against a great Barcelona, and also the Copa del Rey.”
Guus Hiddink is expected to replace Mourinho on an interim basis having held the same role following Luiz Felipe Scolari’s sacking by Chelsea in 2009. Ray Wilkins, who assisted Hiddink during his short tenure in London, has described hiring the Dutchman as the “absolutely perfect” choice.
“As an interim manager, he would love the challenge, I’m sure,” Wilkins said on TalkSport. “He would be the one person I would say would be absolutely perfect to come in to the end of the season and straighten them out.
“I love José and he’s done a fantastic job for Chelsea. He’ll go elsewhere and do a wonderful job for someone. I honestly do believe the players need to take a lot of blame for this as well because they really haven’t performed. The only player that’s performed on any sort of consistent level is Willian.
“With the ball, more often than not there’s no problem. But without the ball they’ve not done half as much as they should have done. They’ve not worked hard enough.”
Cesc Fàbregas has tweeted his thanks Mourinho, saying: “I owe you a lot and we will all miss you. Good luck in the future.”
