In the wake of criticism of his, I can't believe I'm going to use this stupid cliche, park-the-bus tactics, Jose Mourinho has come out all guns blazing in defence of his Chelsea side's approach to football.
In what will surely upset football hipsters across the world, Mourinho labelled some of the thinking behind how football should be played as 'stupid.' Speaking at a press conference yesterday, Mourinho first made a point of saying his 'friend' Brendan Rodgers rang him to congratulate Chelsea for the win on Sunday:
Of course I know his words after the match, but I also know his words today, and today he told me congratulations for a great victory and a great performance.
He’s an intelligent guy. He watched the match for sure on video and, now, I think he understood what happened.
In what now seems like a rather apt prediction of what was going to happen between Bayern Munich and Real Madrid last night, Mourinho went on to slam some of the 'philosophers' in football:
You know, at this moment, football is full of philosophers. People who understand much more than me. Full of people with fantastic theories and philosophies. It’s amazing.
Before going on to say:
If your opponents are very fast on the counter and want space behind your defensive line, if you give them that space you are stupid.
Before making this point Mourinho explained his thinking behind the tactics Chelsea played with during his first stint in charge of the club, 'If you have a goalkeeper like Petr Cech who puts the ball in the opponents’ box, and a striker like Didier Drogba who wins everything in the air, why play short? Because you are stupid. '
In other philosophy news, Guardiola defended his last night despite Munich's defeat:
There’s no valid argument for my system after this result and you can say what you want of course.
But I can’t change what I feel. I like to play with the ball. The reason we lost is we didn't play with the ball. In the second half we played more.
I want to play with the ball and have many players attacking, instead of what Madrid do which is to counter-attack. We have to think if with these players it’s the best way. It’s what I have to discuss with the club.
While Ancelotti also discussed philosophy:
The philosophy of Guardiola continues because he has obtained great many results. We played the perfect game, defended brilliantly and took advantage of the speed of our strikers. Balance was the key. You can attack well. In the first part of the season, we always scored but we conceded many goals. Afterwards working hard we succeeded in not conceding.
With all this talking philosophers it would be disgraceful of me not to include the Monty Python 'Philosophers' World Cup Final' sketch in this post.
hat-tip: Telegraph
