Jose Mourinho talks Tebas, fatigue, international break, Mestalla after Valencia 0-3 Real Madrid

Jose Mourinho talks Tebas, fatigue, international break, Mestalla after Valencia 0-3 Real Madrid Real Madrid kept up their winning run, and have now strung together eight consecutive victories in all competitions, as they faced Valencia at Mestalla and emerged winners with a 3-0 scoreline. Goals from Federico Valverde, Arda Guler, and Kylian Mbappe got the Merengues the full three points, even though the hosts’ physical approach to the game did not make it an easy game for the visitors. As Diario AS has reported, Jose Mourinho talked to the press after the game. He analyzed his team’s win and commented on the performances of some players. The Portuguese coach did not appear too happy with how La Liga scheduled his team’s matches: “A message to La Liga and Tebas… I have to be humble because they have the power. I ask them not to do the same thing to us. Because it’s… I don’t want to say it’s superhuman, because it’s possible, but it’s very difficult. And… if they want to play this joke, they can play it on someone else. Let us have a break after this marathon of travelling and matches, from Sunday to Saturday, which has been… which has been too much. Do you want to know what worries me now? It worries me because… if they stayed here with me and my staff, we would give them very special attention when it comes to… to helping those players recover. But they’re going away with their national teams. And with the national teams… I can imagine, although I’ve never coached a national team, that their coaches want to work. And these players cannot work right now. They need to rest so that they can then play for their national teams. A little later… on Thursday, Friday or around then. But these players need a great deal of attention during their recovery process.” With the win against Valencia, Mourinho became the coach with the best winning percentage in La Liga. While expressing his pride in this, the Real Madrid coach was only looking forward to getting even more wins: “It tells me that we have to win the next one. Because… in life, even with good numbers, numbers that mean something, people eventually forget. We don’t feed off numbers from the past; we feed off the present. And we have to win the next match. But I had no idea about that statistic. Obviously, it’s a source of pride, because Spanish football has had so many top managers throughout its history. To be among them with those numbers is an honour. But, as I said, the next match is the most important thing.” The Portuguese tactician did not want any credit for the improvements shown by his team: “They deserve the credit. The credit belongs to the players. I can’t identify anything in my own work that has been the key to… to making them do this. I simply do my normal job, and they’re responding individually and as a team… they’re responding in a… spectacular way. There’s been tremendous progress, although I think the fact that we had so much possession today and… and… therefore had very little defensive work to do also helped. But we should also point out that whenever we lose the ball, our reaction has always been excellent. As for what you mentioned, there’s an image in front of my dugout in the second half when we lose the ball, Arda is out of position and Kylian makes… a sprint to get back and close down the right-hand side of the block. I think that’s a good example. But it’s only one example. They’re very supportive of one another and very united. And as I said to Real Madrid TV, in my experience, this team smells good.” It was quite a heated game, but not anything the Real Madrid coach was not expecting from a stadium like Mestalla: “Look, Mestalla is… Mestalla is passion. Throughout history, Valencia has always been… a difficult stadium. A stadium that demands a lot from its teams and players. When they’re playing against a Real Madrid side that is individually and collectively far superior, I think… the frustration increases. And… it pushes the players towards a style of play that allows them to compete for the result. The good thing for us is that we remained very calm and… didn’t react. And so on. The red-card incident looked very clear to me from a distance. As for the yellow card for Kylian… I don’t know. I don’t know. I know it was potentially a goal, potentially a goalscoring opportunity. I don’t know whether the referee could or couldn’t have allowed play to continue, but, to be honest, I thought… I could be wrong, I don’t know, but from the dugout it looked to me as though the referee had an outstanding game. An outstanding game. Obviously, this was a stadium where… where people complain. The Bernabéu is one thing, where people go to watch the match calmly, whereas Santander and Valencia are different… These are stadiums where people want to be part of the game. And when they’re frustrated with the result, they complain a little more and create a little more atmosphere. But it was all within the bounds of normality.” While being worried about the upcoming international break, Mourinho did not want to ask anything from his players’ national sides: “No, no. I’m not going to speak to anyone because… I don’t know whether I’ll ever become a national-team coach one day. I don’t know. But I have a feeling that if I ever do, I’ll be very demanding… I’ll be very demanding with the clubs. I’ll think about myself and my team; that’s how I see it. That’s why I don’t feel I can call anyone, even if it’s my friend Carlo… But in Carlo’s case, look carefully: the players going with him are Vinicius, who should play, and… Endrick, who I would be grateful to see Carlo give some playing time to. So… Carlo isn’t the one I’m worried about. But I also don’t think national-team coaches want a player to get injured through accumulated fatigue. I think they also owe it to the players to act professionally when it comes to their recovery. Let’s hope… let’s hope we’re lucky.” The Portuguese coach once again expressed his concern with players’ fatigue: “As I was saying… My only concern is this accumulation of fatigue. They’re obviously extremely fatigued. They’re extremely fatigued. They have to join their national teams on Monday… and on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday they’ll still be getting rid of the muscle fatigue they’re carrying. I’m not talking about mental fatigue, because when you’re winning, you don’t suffer from mental fatigue. But physical fatigue, yes. They’re… they’re… But, as I said, I respect the national-team coaches.” The team’s form has improved lately, but the Real Madrid coach assured that his team remained composed even when they were not getting the expected results: “No, what makes me happy is precisely the fact that… using the word you used, ‘chaos’, after we lost that match… We were never in chaos. We always remained calm. We understood why we had lost that match. We understood where we could improve. We always had… a great deal of… a great deal of composure. I’ll always fight to ensure that people remain balanced during the good times. I always tell them that winning matches at a club like Real Madrid… you can’t fall into… into a state of uncontrollable joy. Winning matches at Real Madrid has to be normal. I see a… a happy dressing room, with horrible music playing loudly; absolutely horrible… But the people are calm, because the message is that winning matches should be normal. When we lose, that’s when we enter your ‘chaos’. And that can then spread into the ‘chaos’ of… the wider Madrid environment and its supporters. But in here, we’re calm, we’re calm.” While revealing that he is suffering from a fever, Mourinho also revealed what he told the Valencia coach after the game: “Tomorrow, I’ll go to the NFL if my temperature drops from 40 to 39 degrees, because I’m dying. I’m dying. I’m tired, I have a fever. I’m dying. But if I recover, I’ll go. And what was your other question? Ah, no, no! I left immediately, with my friend Aguirre… and it was a pleasure to tell him what I said after the match: ‘Don’t be sad, because my players are much better than yours.’ And it’s true. The problem isn’t Aguirre, who is a great coach with a wealth of experience. But the truth is that Real Madrid’s players… are very good. And coaches who have players like mine… are closer to winning.” With this win, Real Madrid can go into the November international break with much more ease of mind than they enjoyed going into the September international break. Hopefully, there would be no undesirable surprises for them during the break, and all of their players will be able to return healthy to their team in two weeks’ time.