Mourinho needs to earn respect
Oct 5 2005
By Tommy Smith, Liverpool Echo
JOSE MOURINHO is a great football manager. He plays to win and so does his team. But he is also an idiot.
It's his attitude which is the problem. After beating Liverpool on Sunday he started moaning that he and Chelsea aren't getting the respect they deserve.
But respect has to be earned and unless he learns to shut up himself he isn't going to get it from anyone. Particularly anyone in Liverpool, where people see right through him.
Mourinho himself started the whole thing between Chelsea and Liverpool when he stirred things up in the Carling Cup final with his stupid gestures to the Reds fans.
Then before last Wednesday's Champions League game he was at it again, bleating on about Liverpool not having scored a goal against Chelsea in last season's semi-final.
Sorry Jose, but the scoreboard doesn't lie and it's in the past now. Just get over it.
Mourinho obviously loves being in the limelight and uses the media. Maybe he even does it all deliberately, getting people to hate and dislike him because he thinks that will damage the opposition.
Mary Poppins speaksPeter Crouch will bring the best out of Michael Owen in England's World Cup qualifier against Austria." Mary...
This isn't sour grapes after Sunday's result. Chelsea deserved to win. But I said before the game I think he's an idiot and I still do.
He's got a top quality side - which he should have with all the money he's got to spend - and anyway he proved at Porto that he can do it without endless supplies of cash.
But as an ambbuttador for his country, he does it no favours at all.
Anyone listening to Mourinho and looking at him could be forgiven for thinking they might give Portugal a miss when it comes to planning their holiday.
But take it from me, they're not all like him!
The big difference between the two sides on Sunday was that Chelsea managed to get down the flanks much more than Liverpool.
In the first game we pushed up on Duff and Robben and they never got the time or the space to exploit the Reds. But every goal essentially came from out wide on Sunday and in return Liverpool offered no width.
Peter Crouch has been doing okay but unless he starts to get crosses from out wide he's going to struggle to get goals.
We've always had good wide players in the past. In the 60s it was Ian Callaghan and Peter Thompson. Then we had Steve Heighway and Jimmy Case. And in the late 80s there was John Barnes.
I don't think it was a 4-1 scoreline on the balance of play and Benitez is right to tell the lads not to lose confidence in themselves.
But where Chelsea were strongest on Sunday was where we were weakest. And we paid a heavy price.
Marsh makes my team
I SAW in one tabloid this week that Rodney Marsh had picked me for his Hannibal Lecter Eleven, alongside the likes of Ron Harris, Jaap Stam, Stuart Pearce, Graeme Souness, Roy Keane and so on. No problem with that.
But this is the same Rodney Marsh who said Wigan would not win half a dozen Premiership games and insisted he'd show his backside if they beat Bolton.
I hope he does, because then everyone will be able to see exactly what he is.
As for my special eleven, I've picked the game's biggest loudmouths. I've gone for Marsh in goal, Marsh at right back, then Marsh at centre half . . .
