From the "Special One" to the "Sacked One", the life of Jose Mourinho

The money infested world of European football is more ruthless than ever before.

And reputations don't count for anything anymore. Like politics, all that matters is "Now".

No long term planning is considered necessary if the result are not produced instantaneously!

And your friends & admirers of yesterday, can be your enemies today and contribute to your downfall tomorrow!

And it all has to do with the corrupting power of money & how players, players agents, club bosses & coaches tend to try to divide & rule rather than unite & win!

Just ask the Special One, Jose Mourinho! He lost the trust & respect of his once admiring players, and with that went their commitment to him to perform……..and the once Special One became the Sacked One!

However, in case of Mourinho, he is attracting little sympathy in personal terms due to his combative style of continuing to blame his players, the referees, medical staff & just about everyone else except himself! He even went as far as suggesting his players had "betrayed" him & maybe they were a bunch of "ordinary" players "he" had mad to perform so well last year, who were incapable of reproducing the same level of performance this year!

From next year, the mere presence in the English Premier League is worth a minimum of 100 million pounds to each club (in broadcast rights money). No club or their owners can afford to be relegated, and Chelsea are only one point above that zone right now.

Having said that, Chelsea should have stuck by a manager with a proven track record & allowed him to stir them back to stability.

Nevertheless, Mourinho has fallen on his own arrogant sword & got a taste of his own medicine!

Sir Bobby Charlton nails what everyone thinks of Mourinho: "…he's a really good coach…but that's as far as I'd go1….he pontificates too much for my liking!…."

Champions League round of 16 draw

The round of 16 draw for the knockout stage of the Champions League was made last Monday.

As usual the luck of the draw produced some sumptuous heavyweight encounters whilst allowing some minnows to progress further to the quarter finals.

My prediction for the group stage this year was better than average: I predicted 12 teams right & four wrong, the four I got wrong who did not make it to the round of 16 were: Man Utd, Porto, Leverkusen & Valencia.

Predicting the results of round of 16 is always harder because there's so much that can happen from mid Dec to mid February, both in terms of team form (e.g. Chelsea with a new coach) & players recovering from injury (e.g. in case of Bayern & Arsenal both of whom have several injured players who should be ok by Feb).

On paper however, some teams are clear favourites regardless of their opponents:

Barcelona vs Arsenal will be the most exciting tie of the round as both teams play attractive attacking football. But even with a fully fit team, Arsenal neither have the quality nor the mental strength to match Barcelona

Real Madrid may be have been inconsistent since the appointment of Rafa Benitez, but Roma are even more unpredictable & only made it with a mere 6 points.

Bayern in my view are clear favourites to beat Juventus unless by February the "on again off again" data of Pep Guardiola's tenure totally unsettle the players.

PSG will account for Chelsea as long as they take their current form into the new year. This is even if Mourinho's temporary replacement pulls the team together & the topic of his replacement does not drag the team down any further.

Manchester City have finally been given the chance to get to quarter finals & as long as they show consistency they should be able to account for Dynamo Kiev.

Wolfsburg will account for a brave Gent side & should consider themselves very lucky with the draw.

Atletico Madrid's experience should account for the bravery of the surprise package PSV, although I personally would like to see a Dutch team back in the quarter final stage & hope PSV win.

Meanwhile whilst Zenit were one of the earliest qualifiers & dominated their group, I believe Benfica can & should do better & I hope to see Benfica progress through