Mourinho lashes out at Frisk and UEFA
Mourinho hit back over UEFA’s claims that Chelsea had asked for assurances that respected official Pierluigi Collina was appointed as the referee for tonight’s game.
And in a typical piece of Mourinho arrogance, the Chelsea boss accused Frisk of bias towards the Spanish giants in the first leg and UEFA of lying about his demands for Collina.
Mourinho’s comments are certain to further disturb UEFA who are already reeling from Chelsea’s protest that Frisk had a half-time discussion with Frank Rijkaard during the first leg.
UEFA have already opened a double disciplinary case for Mourinho’s failure to attend the post-match press conference and their late arrival on to the pitch for the second half of a game which Chelsea lost 2-1.
Chelsea will argue the reason they face the two charges is because Rijkaard was in Frisk’s dressing room.
Mourinho is convinced the opening game hinged on the second-half dismissal of striker Didier Drogba and the Portuguese boss was in no mood to forgive Frisk or UEFA.
He declared: “We feel Didier Drogba should be in the game. He isn’t so it has an influence in both matches. Influence in the first match because we play with 10 men for nearly half and hour. Influence in the second match because we don’t have our main striker. But we have to accept it and do without him. My first point is that we need to play better than Barcelona but my second point is to have a referee without influence in the result because, in the first game, the referee had a direct influence in the result.”
Mourinho then attacked UEFA for their claim he had asked them to ensure Collina took charge of the return leg and basically accused the governing body of lying.
Mourinho said: “I heard this morning what the gentleman said and it is completely untrue. I didn’t ask Collina to referee the game. It is a shame that an institution of the size and importance of UEFA have misrepresented what I said and literally put my words in the air.”
But, amazingly, Mourinho then declared he would have preferred Frisk to have been in charge for the second game - not Collina.
He added: “You ask me who I would have wanted, I would tell you - Anders Frisk. Because maybe he would help us in the same way he helped them. But because I cannot have him, let the best person come.”
Barcelona manager Frank Rijkaard began another psychological battle with Mourinho by hinting Arjen Robben would play for Chelsea.
Chelsea boss Mourinho insisted that Robben, who is recovering from a foot injury, would not be included in the starting XI But Rijkaard, when asked to guess the Chelsea team, had other ideas.
“The Chelsea team?” he said. “One: Robben. Two: Robben. Three: Robben.”
Rijkaard also reiterated there was no truth in Mourinho’s accusations that the Dutchman had spoken to Frisk in the Swedish referees dressing room.
“The accusations are completely false,” said Rijkaard. “I do not want to spend any more time talking about them. I now hope that UEFA will handle the case.”
Mourinho reportedly asked for the times of yesterday’s press conferences to be switched, so Rijkaard spoke first, and Rijkaard reflected: “Maybe he wanted to have the last word.”
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