It’s looking grim for Jose Mourinho . . . and future of Spanish football

Real and Barca look likely to miss out on Wembley showpiece and La Liga is sick — possibly terminally — with the majority of clubs bankrupt
P56 Jose Mourinho
(AP Photo/Frank Augstein)
Guillem Balague30 April 2013

In the insane soap opera that is Real Madrid, anything is possible. But even by their own bizarre standards, what unfolded — or rather, completely imploded — at Borussia Dortmund’s Signal Iduna Park stadium last week was the culmination of a season for ‘Los Merengues’ that has alternated between French farce and Greek tragedy.

The curtain will come down on Jose Mourinho’s three-year tenure at the Santiago Bernabeu at the end of the season but before that Real are in need of a little miracle tonight.

While football constantly shows us that nothing should be taken for granted, Wembley officials should be stocking up on bratwurst ahead of an all-Germany clash rather than paella.

Real Madrid, with a slightly easier job than Barcelona if you want to put it that way, will have to emulate the considerable achievement of fellow countrymen Deportivo, who pulled back a 4-1 deficit to beat AC Milan 4-0 in the quarter-finals in 2004; the only time in the history of the tournament that a three-goal losing margin has been reversed in the knock-out stages.

However, if Dortmund finish the job off, all that will remain is a Copa del Rey Final on May 17 against Madrid’s own version of the “noisy neighbours”, Atletico.

It is feasible that Mourinho will leave Madrid after three years with only two Cup wins and one League title (plus one Super Cup, the Spanish equivalent of the Community Shield).

That may appear scant reward for Spain’s footballing glitterati but Mourinho will say he was up against the best Barcelona side in history, so you draw your own conclusion whether his tenure was successful or not.

So what’s gone wrong? Well, in the good old days, in the loony bin that is football, everyone knew his place. Players played, managers managed and directors directed. Happy days. But not any more.

Conspiracies, back biting, leaks to the Press and a constant clash of egos have created an atmosphere and division in the changing room that is nothing short of toxic and unheard of, even for a club that throughout their history have frequently looked like a sporting recreation of the Borgia dynasty.

But it hasn’t all been Mourinho’s fault. Rumours abound that a new manager had been approached by Real and, shockingly, that he had been told by the more influential players at the club, that he would have to “do it the players’ way” or not be accepted.

When you’re dealing with a Galactico, you need to realise that you’re not talking to, or about, your everyday millionaire. So when Mourinho faced conflicts in the changing room — from, specifically, his Spanish superstars — he reacted in typical Mourinho fashion.

Out went Madrid icon Iker Casillas, skipper for club and country and arguably the best goalkeeper in the world.

Sentenced to spend his time warming up the subs’ bench while simultaneously facing a barrage of cameras, his discomfort as he buried his head under his tracksuit was palpable. Sergio Ramos, Mesut Ozil, Karim Benzema and Gonzalo Higuain have also been dropped at some point.

The message was clear: cross me and this is what you get while, at the same time, making lesser players realise that if he was prepared to do that to the club figurehead, what wouldn’t he do to them.

But what’s happened at Madrid is not a war so much as a suicide pact, and nobody wins those. The fact is that Spanish football is at a crossroads. Pep Guardiola has gone, Mourinho will be leaving and even Cristiano Ronaldo is thought to be contemplating a mega deal Paris St-Germain are rumoured to have put on the table. He will stay but doesn’t have the intention of renewing his contract that finishes in 2015.

The popularity of the two top Spanish clubs has succeeded in masking an inconvenient truth. La Liga is sick, possibly terminally. Appallingly unjust distribution of television monies have helped to create a state where the vast majority of clubs are bankrupt. Like Nero, the incompetents at the Spanish FA fiddled while their Empire burned. Last week in Germany we probably saw the end of an era.

Guillem Balagué is the author of Another Way Of Winning, a biography of Pep Guardiola

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