Words Dept.: entry

While I was away, Jose Mourinho resigned as Chelsea manager. I must confess I felt confused and disorientated by this turn of events. Luckily, there was an excellent distillation of the saga in the Mirror from that renowned expert Fiona Phillips (of GMTV):

We truly won’t see his like again. He was so charismatic and so gorgeous.

You can’t argue with that. The insight continues:

I was asleep when I first got the news on Wednesday night.

My husband had been at the Arsenal game at the Emirates Stadium and woke me up.

At first, I thought something terrible had happened – and indeed it had. When he said Jose had gone I said: “What? No!” I didn’t think it could be true.

But it was true! Yes, in a very real sense, it was true. Amazing, yes, but undeniably… true.

Returning to the chalkboard, Phillips denounces Roman Abramovich and bemoans Chelsea’s recent draws against Blackburn and Rosenborg. Which is all very well, but what about Jose?

There’ll never be another Jose. Football will miss him – his character, his skills and looks.

Amen to that, sister.

By the way, if I read another article headlined “Why we will all miss him”, I may vomit. Other than Chelsea supporters, are Liverpool fans, for example, really going to “miss” the Special One? Or are they, like me, jumping with joy that a seemingly crazed Russian billionaire who knows nothing about football is picking the Chelsea team and instructing Michael Essien on where to place passes?