Barber: Manchester United's Jose Mourinho might be world's best coach

EAST PALO ALTO

The great coach looked bored, or at least sleepy. I worried a little that he would doze off during his press conference at the Four Seasons hotel here.

Like all sportswriters, I have been in the presence of a lot of great coaches and managers. I have had one-on-one interviews with Bill Walsh, Don Shula, Sid Gillman, Nick Saban, Jack Ramsay and Eddie Robinson, the legendary Grambling coach. I have been in group settings with Gregg Popovich, Don Nelson, Bill Belichick, Jim Leyland, Bobby Cox and Hank Stram, among many others.

But it struck me Saturday afternoon as I sat in that drab conference room at the Four Seasons that Jose Mario dos Santos Mourinho Felix might be the greatest manager/coach I’ve ever encountered in person. Certainly, the greatest whom a large percentage of Americans have barely heard of.

Jose Mourinho is the manager of the Manchester United football club, known in these-here parts as a soccer team, and this afternoon he will lead his squad against Real Madrid in a “friendly” at Levi’s Stadium.

It’s part of the 2017 International Champions Cup, which kicked off Thursday and will end July 30, includes matches across the nation and features - in addition to the teams that will play in Santa Clara - the clubs Manchester City, Tottenham Hotspur, Juventus, FC Barcelona, AS Roma and Paris Saint-Germain. Big names, and Manchester United and Real Madrid are the biggest among them.

Almost anywhere else in the world, folks would be gouging out one another’s eyes for a chance to watch these soccer empires. Here in America? As I pulled into the hotel parking lot, I heard a radio ad promoting the availability of tickets for the event.

To be fair, this is a mere exhibition. Some of the Man U and Real Madrid starters will play most of the game, some not at all. But there is star power here. By international standards, this is Warriors-Cavs to the third power.

And Mourinho is the central figure.

Portuguese by birth and by identity, the 54-year-old manager has a mostly unbroken string of success in international soccer. He won in Portugal’s Primeira Liga with Porto (2002-04), in the English Premier League with Chelsea (2004-07, 2013-15), in Italy’s Serie A with Internazionale (2008-2010) and in Spain’s La Liga with Real Madrid (2010-13) before Man U hired him in 2016. He won league titles at all of those stops, plus four European Cups, a trophy presented to the team that survives a best-of-the-best tournament across the continent.

To mark the centenary of the Portuguese Football Federation in 2015, voters distinguished Mourinho as the nation’s greatest coach ever. In January, he was one of 10 men (across all eras) profiled by UEFA.com in a series titled “Coaching greats in profile.”

Pep Guardiola, now the manager of archrival Manchester City, said back in 2011 that Mourinho is “probably the best coach in the world.”

“As a player, you want to play more for him” Manchester United defensive midfielder (mostly) Timothy Fosu-Mensah said Saturday. “There’s a reason why he gets the best out of the players.”

Mourinho is known as a brilliant and adaptable tactician on the soccer pitch. He has used three different formations in Man U’s three U.S. exhibition games (against the L.A. Galaxy and Real Salt Lake of Major League Soccer, and against Manchester City in Houston), typical of his probing approach.

Mourinho also has courted controversy. When Chelsea hired him in 2004, he introduced himself this way: “I have top players and, I’m sorry, we have a top manager. Please do not call me arrogant, because what I say is true. I’m a European champion. I’m not one out of the bottle. I think I’m a special one.”

That address earned him the nickname “The Special One.”

Mourinho has been fined or reprimanded on numerous occasions for criticizing game officials. He butted heads with Cristiano Ronaldo, an international megastar, at Real Madrid, and once poked Barcelona assistant coach Tito Vilanova in the eye during a sidelines-clearing fight. Fans and analysts complain more about his style of play. They accuse Mourinho of defensive tactics that can make his games hard to watch, even as they deliver wins.

Mourinho is known for his dapper dress, but he went soccer-casual at his press conference, wearing a dark sweat suit and running shoes. He is middle-aged handsome, with silver hair and circles under his eyes. His face is expressive, but he betrayed little emotion Saturday. I don’t think he smiled once.

That said, he was open in his answers.

Asked whether it was less than ideal to be playing Real Madrid barely more than two weeks before facing them again in a UEFA Super Cup “fixture” in Macedonia, Mourinho said, “I don’t think it’s a problem, really. Because I don’t think the teams are going to be the same. I don’t think the motivation will be the same.”

There is plenty of motivation for Mourinho and Manchester United today, even in a friendly. The coach led Real Madrid to its first Copa del Rey championship in 18 years, and the next season helped the team set a La Liga record with 32 victories. But Real Madrid let him go by “mutual agreement” a year later after a tempestuous season.

As for the organizations, the fire probably burns brighter for the Manchester squad, thanks to a one-way highway of player movement. Real Madrid has stolen some of Man U’s top players over the past 15 years, including David Beckham, Ronaldo and Ruud van Nistelrooy.

They almost got goalkeeper David De Gea, too, but their proposed deal ran into a paperwork problem in 2015. In the other direction, Real Madrid has consistently thwarted Manchester United’s attempts to poach players like Ronaldo and Gareth Bale.

In a tangible sense, this game means little more than a chance for Mourinho and Real Madrid coach Zinedine Zidane to tinker with their lineups. On a wider scale, it represents another opportunity for either to claim a ribbon in the battle between the two most glamorous soccer teams in the world.

For the rest of us, it serves as a reminder that some of the best athletes, and coaches, on the planet play a sport that exists on our back burner.

You can columnist writer Phil Barber at 707-521-5263 or phil.barber@pressdemocrat.com. Follow him on Twitter: @Skinny_Post.