Jose Mourinho Is Nothing Without His Aura and Must Undergo a Personal Revolution

He was once The Special One, then The Happy One, but on Sunday Jose Mourinho was The Humiliated One. His return to Stamford Bridge as Manchester United manager indeed ended (and, in fact, started too) in embarrassment, with Chelsea inflicting a 4-0 defeat on the visitors and their former manager. They say you should never go back for a reason.

Even after everything endured by Mourinho last season, this was a personal nadir. He is no longer considered European football’s go-to-guy for instant success. His demise at Chelsea, followed by his stuttering start at United, have tainted his reputation, compromising his standing and stature. Will he ever be the same manager again?

United are counting on it. They have nowhere else to turn if Mourinho consigns himself to the same managerial scrapheap David Moyes and Louis van Gaal were dumped on. But what if Mourinho has lost what made him Mourinho? What if the thing that once made him the greatest manager of his generation has vanished for good?

There are three primary classifications of coach. The disciplinarian is often painted as the stereotypical football manager, in the mould of someone like Sir Alex Ferguson. They rule with an iron fist (or a hair dryer), ensuring that nobody steps out of line. When they do, they are cast aside. Players are motivated by fear as much as anything else.

In the modern game, with players just as powerful as managers, this has become an approach of a bygone age. There is no place for disciplinarians in football any longer, with such a confrontational ethos likely to fracture a dressing room rather than galvanise it. 

And so tacticians have become the archetypal figurehead at the top of the sport. Pep Guardiola is this classification’s vanguard, even if he can be a bit of a disciplinarian at times—as shown on Saturday when he locked his Manchester City players in their dressing room for 45 minutes after the full-time whistle. While football once valued natural leaders more than anyone else, now thinkers and plotters are the game’s patriarchs. 

Mourinho bridges the …

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