Jose Mourinho Claims His Chelsea Were the Best Champions & Takes Dig at 'Short-Term' Managers
Manchester United manager Jose Mourinho has claimed he "prepares clubs for success" and taken a dig at short-termists who leave clubs "ready for failure".
The Portuguese coach has often been labelled as a short-term solution and a pragmatist but he has insisted that he keeps the future in mind despite his reputation for brief but successful spells at clubs.
And his dismissal of managers that finish a long tenure at a club having regressed suggests at another potential slight at Arsenal's Arsene Wenger.
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“If people say that because I move from club to club, they’re right, but I don’t think I am [short-termist]," Mourinho told the Times.
"I prepare clubs for success. I think I prepare clubs in a way where, when I leave, the new manager arrives at a top club.
"And that is not short-term even if you leave. If you’re in a club one or two years — or any job — if you leave a structure to be even more successful without you than with you, that’s not short-term. That’s long-term. That’s long-term.
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“What is the opposite of success? Failure. One who leaves the club in conditions for failure. That is a short-term manager. You can be there ten or 20 years and when you leave the club, it’s ready for failure.”
As self-assured as ever, Mourinho also backed the quality of his title-winning Chelsea side of 2014/15.
That team, in his eyes, does not get the praise it deserves, and nor does his philosophy of winning at all costs.
"If a manager defends a doctrine of ‘I win and I play amazingly well’, I applaud," Mourinho said. "But the ones who don’t win, who defend something that I don’t understand? I don’t get it.
“For me, let’s be honest and objective. The last three Premier League champions — Chelsea with Mourinho, Leicester with [Claudio] Ranieri, Chelsea with [Antonio] Conte — which of these teams was the most offensive one? Which played more quality football? It was mine. But nobody says.”
