Mourinho contro tutti

I can't blame Jose Mourinho, who was in top form yesterday as he lashed out against the Italian sports media in a hilarious press conference.

It's true, the Italian press and TV coverage of their football is only minimally concerned with the game. It's a witch hunt rather than a sport. They are so negative. No emphasis on great goals, breathtaking saves, beautiful moves, exciting football. The main concern is the referees' performance. Reporters do their best to force the losing teams' coaches to complain about perceived refereeing errors. When a team loses, in many cases they ask the coach if he thinks he's going to be sacked. As they enquire about the possibility of the coach losing his job, the screen displays the name of that team's best player of the match, next to the name of their worst player. I'm sure they do it to boost the latter's morale, so that he can improve in his next match. It's disgusting.

However, Mourinho omitted to mention, as he complained about what he believes is an orchestrated campaign to give the impression that his team Inter are on top of the league table thanks to the help of referees, that it was Inter themselves who for many years were in the middle of much more vicious similar campaigns against Juventus. They were on the losing end for such a long time (17 years to be precise) that they ended up engineering a scandal implicating most Italian top teams, but of course not themselves, to wipe out all opposition. It was only then that they were able to win anything.

Benvenuto in Italia, caro Mister Mourinho!