On Friday we were treated towards the Manchester United manager’s tribute to Claudio Ranieri sacked by Leicester City the previous evening. What needs to have been a straightforward press conference in front of the EFL Cup final was instead hijacked as some high theatre.
You can get legitimate gripes within that perspective. Since winning the title, Leicester players have dined on autobiographies, clothing lines, exclusive edition rums or even a Hollywood blockbuster from the pipeline. We have seen £100,000 contracts dished out left, right and centre.
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| Claudio Ranieri |
What is not matched this coming year is the amount of desire from that historic year. Leicester’s players simply could not deal with winning in addition to their manager could not handle training a winning team.
There is no doubt though that Mourinho investigated the situation externally and deduced that the same thing was happening to Ranieri as what went down to him at Chelsea.
Since his first spell at Chelsea, Mourinho differentiated himself from Ranieri in terms of winners and losers. Anything Ranieri achieved as Chelsea coach, or in Italy, or Spain, was demeaned.
Both coached a team to the league title only to be jettisoned before the following season was out.
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| Jose Mourinho |
The rumours of dressing room unrest in regard to Ranieri’s decision-making echo what actually transpired with Mourinho.
Mourinho is employing his platform to indicate his credentials certainly not to indicate the contrast to Ranieri’s anymore, but to demonstrate the similarity in their fates.
Maybe Jose now realises he, the 'winner', and Ranieri, the 'loser', aren’t so different after all. But he needs everyone to understand it.
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