Chelsea looking to The Normal One
The same accent, the same intonation, the same clarity, the same conviction.
If anything his command of the language is even better, but you would expect that.
André Villas-Boas has English roots, was working for Bobby Robson at the age of 17, studied for his coaching badges in England and Scotland, and spent three years in London as Mourinho’s right-hand man, plotting the downfall of their Premier League opponents.
Now it seems he’s on his way back to take charge at Chelsea, destined to become the Premier League’s youngest manager just as he was once the world’s youngest international coach and is currently the youngest manager ever to win a European trophy, not to mention a domestic and European treble.
It would be astonishing progress, even for a man who broke most Portuguese records in his first season at Porto, including several set by his former boss. But Villas-Boas has been remarkably calm about his success.
“I’m a very reserved person,” he says. “I like to share my success with the people that bring me that success, from top to bottom, that sit around me... I am just a fortunate guy. Maybe reserved and fortunate is what I would write about a person like me.”
Comparisons with Mourinho were already being made when Villas-Boas left Inter Milan two seasons ago. He took over at Academica de Coimbra when they were bottom of the table, saved them from relegation and was promptly recruited by Porto’s legendary president Jorge Nuno Pinto da Costa, just like Mourinho before him.
Both Mourinho and Villas-Boas owe their start in football and their initial education to Bobby Robson. Both have a reputation for meticulous preparation of their players and detailed study of the opposition.
And while Villas-Boas seems more benign than Mourinho, he too has a capacity to goad opponents to self-destruction, as he proved last season when relations between Porto and Benfica reached an all-time low.
Yet the differences are as important as the similarities. Villas-Boas is forever playing down his own role.
“People associate me with one of the best managers in the world, and I just have to live with that. I don’t think that creates any kind of problem but it’s the reality.
“People think I am the next one, and I am not the next one. I am a normal coach who benefits from having top players. One day I’ll be in a team when I don’t have this kind of talent and I’ll be a sh*t one.”
Inevitably there are similarities in tactics. But the Villas-Boas 4-3-3, which seems to be his preferred set-up, is much more adventurous than Mourinho’s.
PORTO were uncharacteristically cagey against Braga in Dublin. The occasion, and the chance of the Treble, seemed to inhibit the players. On the way to the final they scored 10 goals against Spartak Moscow and put seven past Villarreal. In the league they thumped Benfica 5-0 and in the Portuguese Cup final they hit Guimaraes for six.
At times they have played with a seven-man attack and Villas-Boas says his model is the Total Football of Rinus Michels and Johan Cruyff. He also is a big admirer of Mourinho’s current nemesis, Pep Guardiola.
So there is an aristocratic approach to the game along with an aristocratic background — his great uncle bore the title of Viscount of Guilhomil — and a nice mix of legend to go with it. Look on the internet and you will find one of the famous Villas-Boas pre-match briefings which earned him his reputation as “Mourinho’s eyes and ears”. But whether it’s totally genuine is unclear. Likewise the story of how his schoolboy match analysis was used by Bobby Robson in press conferences may not be entirely true.
What is true, however, is that he still has all his Premier League analysis stowed away in his laptop, along with an almost photographic memory of the strengths and weaknesses of Chelsea’s performances.
Should The Normal One be on his way back to Stamford Bridge, they will be getting the best-prepared manager that money can buy. Which may make that €15 million buy out clause a little easier for Roman Abramovich to swallow.
