In one match, he yelled at me aggressively:
"Do you think two beautiful passes are enough?
Do you think giving 50% of your level is enough for me?"
I took off my shirt and threw it!
He said to me:
"You're a coward! You don't want to fight harder to win over the fans! You look like a good player, but as a person... you're a coward!"
At that moment, I hated Mourinho — but in reality, I adore him… it was a lesson.
To be fair, he doesn't care about names. The most important thing Mourinho believes in is a player's will to win and his work ethic!
Even Ronaldo wasn't spared his criticism for some slacking.
I remember in one of our legendary La Liga matches, Ronaldo scored a hat-trick against Sevilla, and we won the game 6–0.
We all thought that after the match we’d receive praise!
But we were surprised when he pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket, with notes on when and where each of us lost the ball.
Then he said:
"Even the guy with the hat-trick was being careless!"
He didn’t care if you were on Maradona’s or Zidane’s level — what mattered was that you were a good person and a brave man.
Truly… he’s the best, or rather, the best coach I’ve ever worked with.
From Mesut Özil’s book, speaking about Mourinho
In one match, he yelled at me aggressively:
"Do you think two beautiful passes are enough?
Do you think giving 50% of your level is enough for me?"
I took off my shirt and threw it!
He said to me:
"You're a coward! You don't want to fight harder to win over the fans! You look like a good player, but as a person... you're a coward!"
At that moment, I hated Mourinho — but in reality, I adore him… it was a lesson.
To be fair, he doesn't care about names. The most important thing Mourinho believes in is a player's will to win and his work ethic!
Even Ronaldo wasn't spared his criticism for some slacking.
I remember in one of our legendary La Liga matches, Ronaldo scored a hat-trick against Sevilla, and we won the game 6–0.
We all thought that after the match we’d receive praise!
But we were surprised when he pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket, with notes on when and where each of us lost the ball.
Then he said:
"Even the guy with the hat-trick was being careless!"
He didn’t care if you were on Maradona’s or Zidane’s level — what mattered was that you were a good person and a brave man.
Truly… he’s the best, or rather, the best coach I’ve ever worked with.
From Mesut Özil’s book, speaking about Mourinho 💙
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