Mourinho: "We have six points, and that’s half the road to qualification"

José Mourinho appeared in the press room at the Olympic Stadium and analyzed the memorable comeback against Roma in the second matchday of the Champions League group stage: "For the poor first half, the responsibility lies with the coach, and for the good second half, the responsibility lies with the players. In my mind, as a principle, I always think I’m doing the right thing and never think I’m doing wrong. I always think about meritocracy, but football is a 90-minute game and, at the highest level, it is strategic. The opponents matter and play too, and today’s opponent was incredibly strong and a formidable team."

"I knew their energy would run out. It’s impossible to play 90 minutes at the pace they play. I made the changes I thought I should make, but I must say that in the first half, they overpowered us and surprised us with Soulé’s open positioning, and Cucurella couldn’t push up to Wesley, leaving us constantly in a two-against-one situation. In the second half, we reorganized, and when we were stable, we conceded a goal we shouldn’t have. Then came the third, and if they had scored four or five, people would say I’m crazy. We won 4-3, and they say I did very poorly in the first half with the lineup we played. That’s football. In the end, Inter and Roma, the two strongest teams in Italy, 6 points."

Is this victory positive for La Liga?
"La Liga is La Liga and the Champions League is the Champions League. As I said before, six points and six points is half the road toward qualification. With Benfica, after four games last year, we had four points and we qualified. It’s not over yet, but we already have six points. And this is important for us. Six matches remain, and we already have six points. We’ve played against two top-level Italian teams. Very good for us."

Vini Jr.
“You are the journalist, but can I ask you a question? Do you think it’s normal that a player from a Spanish team, about to play an important match for Spanish football, finds out two hours before the game that they’ve been suspended for four matches? You don’t need to answer me. It’s not normal. Couldn’t this have been done now or tomorrow morning? We found out on the bus, almost when we were already arriving at the stadium. This is turning into something we say in Portuguese, 'a cat hiding with its tail showing.' Now the cat is no longer hiding, but doing things shamelessly. Two hours before a match involving a Spanish team, a player finds out they’ve been suspended for four matches, and you kill a player. It’s not normal, but it already seems normal to me because the cat is no longer hiding."

Tactical Approach
"The first half by Vini Jr. is my fault or the positive fault of Gasperini. He did very well. He placed Wesley and Soulé wide with Cucurella. Vini Jr. against Wesley is very difficult because Wesley is a fantastic player. They overwhelmed us on that side with two against one. Sometimes Mancini joined in, making it three against one, and they overwhelmed us there. It was difficult for Vini Jr. In the second half, I gave him the freedom to play on the other side. Obviously, Diomande has a different kind of defensive action. Wesley’s offensive impact ended with Diomande. And Vini Jr. lost a ball he shouldn’t have, but that’s it. I also make mistakes. It’s a shame the mistake came now that he was improving. And being Vini Jr. in the sense that he was happy again. It’s a shame that he’s out."

Did Vini Jr. ask you about the substitution?
“It’s normal for him to ask, and it’s normal for him not to be happy. I don’t like it if he does what so many do afterward, like throwing the bottle or kicking it. Those are things I obviously don’t like. But the frustration of an important player is normal, and after the match, he was very happy with his team’s victory. That, for me, is the most important thing.”

Do you think being informed about the suspension before the match affected him?
“A player tries to block feelings and emotions. Obviously, for different reasons, but I’ve also had to do it to play here against my people, to play here in my stadium, to play here with people I love. I’ve also had to block. A player also has to have this ability, and I think he did quite well. The difficulties he had in the first half were the positive fault of Gasperini, who did very well to complicate things for us there. They’re not Vini Jr.’s fault; they’re the fault of Gasperini, who is a very high-quality coach.”

The last ten minutes
“If we had started the match with the eleven players that finished the game, I think they would have scored five on us because it would have been impossible to sustain such an intense team. There are moments and moments. There’s strategy. Sometimes the coach is an idiot because he thinks strategically wrong. Other times, a coach is very good because he thinks well. I thought, well, I’m not going to be a genius saying I had prepared everything to go from 3-1 to 4-3. It’s not true. But I truly thought that in the last 20 minutes, I had changes to make, and those changes could make a difference. For instance, I told the players that it’s very difficult for someone like Mancini, who plays man-to-man, not to get a yellow card. And when he gets it, either he stays on the field with a yellow, or they substitute him. And it’s a thing... They have five defenders and another five on the bench. Why? Because of how they play, man-to-man, there are many difficult situations where a player pushes, commits a foul, things that earn a yellow card. Physically, Hermoso faces Diomande, and when Hermoso runs out of gas, Endrick comes in. Give me a bit of credit too.”

Do you think learning about Vini Jr.’s suspension two hours before the match is a declaration of war?
“At the very least, it’s disrespectful. Playing in Athens on Wednesday night. Arriving in Madrid probably at 5 in the morning, something like that, and then playing on Saturday in Valencia on a weekend that precedes an international break week makes no sense, absolutely none. They make you play on Saturday in Valencia, which is an extremely tough match. It doesn’t seem innocent to me. I don’t buy the usual excuses because I’ve been in football for 25 years. The excuses about TV, that TV decided and chose the match for Saturday, I don’t buy that anymore. I’m too old to buy that. And this story about Vini Jr., finding out two hours before the match that he has a four-game suspension... It doesn’t deserve comments. Madridistas are not stupid. And I’ll do everything possible to open people’s eyes.”

Praise for Espí
“I must say that when the possibility of Gonzalo leaving came up, who was a player I liked a lot but was a fantastic deal for Real Madrid, the club’s structure presented me with three names, and one of them was Espí. And whoever brought him forward did their job very well. After seeing him, I always thought he’d be a player with an important profile for us. For an attacker to be in the same squad as Mbappé is not easy because Kylian is a hugely important player, and it’s not easy to rotate with a player like him. Not because of status, but because of quality. It’s very difficult to say, okay, now against Sevilla Mbappé doesn’t play, and Espí does. I won’t do that, but opportunities will come, and when he responds as he always has, he’s a player whose natural tendency is to play more and more and become an increasingly important option.”