Defiant Mourinho will not be silenced

CHELSEA manager Jose Mourinho insists he will not be silenced as he waits for the Football Association to determine if he will be punished for calling Wigan’s Lee McCulloch a “cheat.”

The Portuguese coach has been one of the most outspoken in the Barclays Premiership since he took charge of Chelsea in the summer of 2004.

However, he stands by his right to say his piece.

“Everyone has a right to an opinion. I can arrive in England and express my opinion,” Mourinho said. “If criticism were ferocious and without intellectual objectivity they should show me the way to their airport.

“It is important to have an opinion and not be afraid to express it, knowing there will be criticism.”

His first season at the club was littered with rows involving UEFA and the Football Association as well as referees, managers and players.

Mourinho was called “the enemy of football” last season when he claimed Swedish referee Anders Frisk was spotted talking to Barcelona coach Frank Rijkaard in the tunnel at the Nou Camp during their Champions League clash.

His comments sparked death threats to Frisk from irate Chelsea fans and eventually led to the official’s retirement from the game.

UEFA later dismissed his comments after an investigation into the incident and banned him from the touchline for both legs of Chelsea’s quarter-final tie with Bayern Munich.

Mourinho was also fined £5,000 by the FA for alleging Manchester United were “cheats” and this season his unsavoury public spat with Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger has refused to die down.

Both managers continued their row after Sunday’s clash at Highbury which Chelsea won 2-0. Mourinho was unhappy with Wenger’s decision to question the authenticity of his apology for labelling the Arsenal manager a “voyeur” earlier this season.

Mourinho wrote the apology inside a Christmas card and as a result of Wenger’s distrust, the Chelsea manager refused to shake his hand at the end of the game. The altercation came just a week after Mourinho had told full-back William Gallas not to give the ball back to Wigan from a throw-in because he felt McCulloch was cheating by feigning injury.

Wenger insisted he meant no disrespect to Mourinho by failing to acknowledge his apology as he looked to end their “ridiculous” Christmas card row.

Mourinho walked off down the Highbury tunnel without shaking hands with Wenger as he was annoyed by the Arsenal manager’s failure to thank him for his Christmas card before the game. Mourinho had attempted to defuse the public war of words between them by writing an apology for calling Wenger a “voyeur”, but was angered when a member of Arsenal’s coaching staff questioned whether he had penned the card himself.

Wenger, who insisted he was focusing on the match before kick-off and had simply not encountered Mourinho, responded: “I find it ridiculous. I am aware of this card, but it has been treated like a CIA bomb. It is a little bit surprising. Nothing really happened. We got this card and we didn’t make a fuss of it.

“We didn’t blank anybody. I just went to the game and I was ready to talk to anybody after the game about anything. I’d never talk to a rival manager before a game.

“I appreciated the sentiment in the card. It was an apology, but I had no pre-conceived ideas or special resentment because once I said it’s over, it’s over.

“I went to shake hands at the end of the game but, as for the rest, I don’t know what I can do about it.”