"It was essential to win"

POST-MATCH

José Mourinho liked what he saw, especially in the second half, at AFS-Benfica (0-3), from Matchday 6 of the Liga Betclic, played on Saturday, September 20, at the Estádio do Clube Desportivo das Aves. The coach admitted that "it was essential to win."

Benfica improved in the second half, as José Mourinho explained in statements to Sport TV.

"We played much better, we moved the ball around, we found solutions, we found depth, we turned the game around several times and we dominated. In the second half, the game was over, obviously I liked it much more," he said.

José Mourinho recalled the importance of helping his players "break free from the negative moment."

"I told them that, as players for a big club, they had to enjoy the pressure, enjoy the responsibility. I didn't manage to get that message across completely, but then, in the second half, I managed to get them to have high levels of confidence, to be able to play, to settle the game. With the score at 3-0, the game was over," he emphasized, concluding: "Today it was essential to win."

WHAT HAS CHANGED

"The last thing I want is to be the one to analyze for you what we have managed to change. What we have managed to change, or looking at things in a very pragmatic way, is that in the last game we drew and lost two points, and today it was very important to win, and we did it. Analyzing the game also from a mental point of view, but which is then reflected in how the game was played, I would say that these are men who play football, and in the first half we saw a team that wanted it badly, a team that already had some things that I liked, but we also saw a team under pressure, a nervous team, which lost the ball too often and took some time to stabilize. The men who play football scored a goal, and in the second half, from a mental point of view, I just needed to free the boys, as they say, to tell them that we had to go out and finish the game, we had to go out with a winning attitude, we couldn't give Aves [AFS] the chance to get into the game and contest it, and they accepted that confidence well, they accepted that approach to the game well. Then, in the second half, the quality and confidence levels were very high. The team played really well in the second half. Even after going 2-0 up, I told them that if we find our opponents in a difficult moment, we have to take advantage of that difficult moment and not let them recover, and that's what we did: 2-0, 3-0, game over. And the most important thing is obviously the 3 points, but now we have 2 days to, I won't say work hard, but rather 2 days to recover and fine-tune a few small things, and then another difficult game awaits us."

FEEL WHAT IT MEANS TO BE A BENFICA FAN

"[Feelings about returning to Benfica after 25 years] I didn't think about it much, I said I wasn't coming here to celebrate my career, I obviously didn't come here to celebrate my career, but even before arriving at the stadium you feel what it means to be a Benfica fan, you enter the stadium and you feel it even more, and I confess, without any problem, that at the end of the game, yes, at the end of the game I thought: 25 years have flown by, but 25 years that haven't changed my nature, that haven't changed my passion, haven't changed my way of being, of living, haven't changed anything at all."

"HURRY UP, THERE'S TRAINING TOMORROW MORNING"

"[Does the team need confidence?] It does, but we coaches are all different, we all think differently, some diametrically opposed, others more or less, but none of us are the same, we always have things to add, to improve, sometimes to make worse. But with this short time, I wanted to give stability mainly to those players who had been playing practically all the time. At the same time, there were things I really liked, because Benfica is a team I analyzed well. I played against them twice in a short period of time, I watched many games, I analyzed my own games against them, it was a team I knew well, there were things I wanted to touch very, very, very lightly or almost not at all. To give you an example, defensive set pieces, I didn't have time to train, what am I going to change? I'm going to believe in what was done before, done well, and keep it. There were other things, but those are the things I told your colleague that I don't want to analyze myself. I'll leave it to the analysts to analyze, and if they can't analyze it, even better for me, but there were things we did that, even though we played with practically the same players, we did things differently. We worked for an hour and a half yesterday, and I thank the players for their professionalism, their passion for the club, but at the same time for the way they welcomed me, the way I felt they were embracing what we were working on, and that's it. If we had lost, it would obviously have been a disaster in terms of points; winning isn't phenomenal, but it was the best thing we could do, it was winning, they needed to win after losing two points and after a psychologically heavy defeat, and, well, as I told them after the game, it was good, but it was nothing extraordinary, so hurry up, tomorrow there's training in the morning."

BENFICA IS A "GIANT CLUB"

"First of all, I want to thank you [British journalist] for being here. You follow my career everywhere, I have no problem saying that you are a good friend. I can be a friend to journalists, and I thank you for being here. Honestly, I always thought I would return to Portugal. But I always thought it would be for the national team. I knew that the national team would come sooner or later. It came earlier, and I couldn't accept it. I thought that one day it would happen, I think it's the natural consequence of my career. Benfica happened, a giant club. And I'm not saying it's a giant club because I'm at Benfica, I said it recently at the press conference when I played against Benfica for Fenerbahçe, I said that Benfica is truly a giant club. [Being back in the Champions League, the competition you belong to] No, I belong to all three competitions: the Champions League, the Europa League, and the Conference League, I belong to all of them. But it's good to be back. But again, I have to put my emotions aside. The truth is that we lost three points in a game we couldn't afford to lose [Qarabag], but it happened. We'll have to make up for those points somewhere else. [Reception in Lisbon and media attention] For better or worse, that's how I am. He [Gonçalo Guimarães] knows he'll have an easier job because I don't care if people write good things about me, I don't care if they write bad things about me. I don't want drafts every day, I don't know what's being said in the press, that's how I am. Congratulations [Gonçalo Guimarães], you have an easier life with me." 

GROUP OF FRIENDS LIKE A BROTHERHOOD

"[With two more days of training, can you already put two fingers in the team?] Yes, yes. Obviously, it's two days of recovery, but you can recover on your own, or you can try to recover by working, even if very passively, with very low intensity, but you can try to do it. I've done it and I do it because I'm used to playing many games in a row. You can work at very, very low intensities, with very, very, very low densities, but you can try to add some more ideas, always along the same lines, without distorting too much what they were, but adding a few things. We pressed in a slightly different way. We positioned ourselves with the ball in a slightly different way. I think that in the first half, we were perhaps a little hasty in our movement and in our search for a change of wing and depth, in an almost exaggerated way. But in the second half we played better positionally. And it's like I said, men who play football, happy men, relaxed men, play better than men who are under pressure and sad. And that was basically it. The players deserve congratulations because they really wanted it. I felt that they really wanted it. And they didn't want it for me. It's not that I asked them to do something for me, or that they were focused on me. No, I think they were focused on themselves. A friendly group, very young guys – most of them – but nice guys, very friendly guys, those guys who grew up at Benfica, they really seem like brothers, Tomás with António, António with Rego, or Rego with Veloso, it really seems like a brotherhood. And it's a beautiful group, which I will try to help with my experience. At least today I helped them make the three-hour trip with a different smile than the three-hour trip up, where I felt the atmosphere was heavy." 

NO MIND GAMES, NO ENEMIES

"[Are you already thinking about the next game against FC Porto?] No, I didn't come to Benfica to annoy FC Porto. I came to Benfica to enjoy the opportunity to coach again at a high level, at a big club, a club with ambitions to win. That's why I came, I didn't come to annoy anyone. I don't think they'll be upset with me if I tell you what I'm about to say. OK, it's personal, I hope they won't be upset with me. After coming to Benfica, I spoke to President Villas-Boas and I spoke to President Varandas, from Sporting. If we have a good relationship, and if we are friends, and if we respect each other, the fact that I am Benfica's coach does not mean that I am here to wage war. Now, if you ask me if I expect to be cheered at the Dragão in two weeks, obviously not. Obviously. I played at the Dragão for Chelsea, and I wasn't cheered at all. Imagine going to the Dragão with Benfica. But it's part of life. FC Porto is a very important part of my history, and I am a very important part of FC Porto's history. Last week... I'll tell you the story. Half of my staff are from the north, and half are from the south. So we agreed that while we're unemployed, we have to work. We have to work, we have to stick together. So we decided: we'll go to different places, whether in Portugal or abroad, but only to clubs that are winning. Clubs where our presence raises absolutely no questions. So it was: FC Porto last week; this weekend, it would be Lisbon, we were going to see Sporting play Moreirense; in two weeks' time, we were going to Madrid to see Real Madrid play Villarreal. I had decided: we won't go to Benfica, Inter Milan, which isn't doing well either, and there was some talk that I could go, I don't know what, but we won't go. But we were going to continue like this. I go to the Dragão with no other intention. The president [André Villas-Boas] was incredibly kind to me, the fans were incredibly kind to me, which I think I deserve. But now... Enemies for 90 minutes. I can't even say that word anymore, given how I've grown as a man. Sports enemies. I don't even like that. FC Porto wants to win, we want to win, that's it. There's no more to it than that.."