Category: UEFA Competitions

The manager got lost in the kind of cynical rage that dominates the digital world, but football should not follow his example

“Like Jaws if everyone in Jaws worked for Jaws.” Watching José Mourinho circle the touchline at the Puskas Arena on Wednesday night, giving off that horribly persuasive eau de la haine, it was hard not to be reminded of the words of cousin Greg, Succession’s beanpole idiot savant, describing a similar scene of top-down toxicity.

We know that Mourinho energy by now, the toxic theatre, the performative rage, the love of conspiracy and imagined injustice. What does he look like these days, with his perfect shock of white hair, the quicksilver glare? An arms dealer on his way to play golf? A wrongly convicted serial killer who lives in a palazzo and drinks fine wine and turns out at the end of the movie to be a serial killer after all? Some kind of sporting dark lord: wronged football Jesus?

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• Footage shows fans harassing Anthony Taylor in Budapest
• PGMOL condemns ‘unjustified and abhorrent’ behaviour

Professional Game Match Officials Limited (PGMOL) says it is appalled by the “unjustified and abhorrent” abuse directed at Anthony Taylor after video footage emerged of him being accosted by angry fans at Budapest airport.

Taylor and his family can be seen trying to evade a mob who were shouting at him as he travelled home after refereeing Wednesday’s Europa League final between Roma and Sevilla in the Hungarian capital, which the Spanish side won on penalties after an ill-tempered 1-1 draw.

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• Roma manager escalates criticism after Europa League final
• Uefa could take action over this and his press conference

José Mourinho escalated his verbal attacks on the referee Anthony Taylor after Roma’s Europa League final defeat by swearing at him in a car park while calling the English official “a disgrace”.

Mourinho was filmed shouting abuse at Taylor in English and Italian in the VIP car park before leaving the Puskas Arena in Budapest. Towards the end of about 50 seconds of criticism he walked up to the passenger door of what appears to be the van in which Taylor is to be driven away.

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Sevilla are champions for the seventh time, eventuallywinning a bad-tempered, eminently forgettable match on spot-kicks after three long hours

• Read Sid Lowe’s match report from the Puska Arena in Budapest

Mailbag: “I thought that after Spurs things would only get worse for Mourinho,” writes Kári Tulinius. “But things have clicked between him and Roma, both club and the fans. It’s a bit like one of those films where a curmudgeon who lives alone in a hut is shown that he can still love and be loved by the village’s new librarian or chocolatier or astronaut.”

“Spanish saffron and Italian oregano, stewing together with Hungarian paprika in a steaming cauldron,” writes Peter Oh. “What a delicious football feast for the ages! I have no idea what’s going to happen but I’m pretty sure someone’s gonna have a bad case of heartburn when all is said and done.”

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After the 178 matches (including qualifiers) and 464 goals you’ve almost certainly let pass you by because you’ve better things to do on a Thursday night, now might finally be the time to start taking an interest in this season’s Big Vase. Having survived the dreaded Thursday-Sunday grind through the season, Sevilla and Roma have been rewarded with a place in tonight’s final – scheduled for the slightly more exalted European week night of Wednesday – and it could be an absolute belter. An apparently immovable Euro Vase force, Sevilla have not lost any of the six finals they have contested. If they are to win a seventh they must beat a side managed by José Mourinho, who has masterminded victory in each of the five European finals he has been involved in, but doesn’t like to talk about it.

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Striker who won Champions League in 2021 and Conference League last season is aiming for glory in Europa League final

Give it a couple of days and Roma’s fans may change their tune. Well, not the tune exactly, but the temptation could be to tweak the words a little. In the Curva Sud at the Stadio Olimpico where they watched, enamoured, as Tammy Abraham belted out the club’s anthem and belted in the goals, they long since took to calling him Tre Punti Tammy, Tammy Three Points. Come back from Budapest with that 15kg hunk of silver and it could be time to call him Tammy Three Cups.

After all, the England striker says: “It is the only one left not in my cabinet.” Winner of the Champions League with Chelsea in 2021, the Europa Conference League in 2022, victory against Sevilla in the final of the Europa League in Hungary on Wednesday would complete a unique collection, all three continental competitions clinched and consecutively. Tammy Tre Tituli has a nice ring to it, echoes of José Mourinho’s famous “zero tituli” line, uttered more than a decade ago and repeated ever since, slipping into Italy’s footballing lexicon, his use of a u where there should be an o making it more memorable.

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Manager says he is as motivated as ever with the Italians aiming to win a second consecutive European trophy against Sevilla

Not long ago, an Italian radio show opened the phones for listeners and a final-year biology student called Marta rang in with a problem. On Wednesday Marta graduates from university in Rome but, she explained, her dad won’t be there with her: he will be in Budapest instead. When it mattered, Roma came first. The story was soon everywhere, the subject of debate, and while not everyone agrees – the club’s former captain Daniele De Rossi said he was staying behind to be with his daughter – plenty were on her father’s side.

This is only the fourth Uefa final Roma have reached, after all. Half of those have now been under José Mourinho, who has won all five of those he has been at, including last year’s Conference League for Roma. That was their first trophy since 2008. If Marta is not happy with Mourinho, everyone else is delighted. Win the Europa League and some think it would be the greatest achievement of his career, bigger even than what he did at Porto or Internazionale.

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There is something magnificent about the Roma manager’s Europa Cup final date with Sevilla on Wednesday

Perhaps it’s different if you live in Italy or if Serie A is the league you follow most closely. Perhaps, then, José Mourinho is still a cussed ball of fury, bearing ancient grudges, determined never to relinquish a slight, real or imagined, the Keyser Söze of the dugout, the Karla of the press conference, manipulating and plotting, radiating paranoia as he insists his club is the victim of a conspiracy by the referees, the media and the football authorities.

But if not, there was something almost heartwarming about Roma’s 0-0 draw at Bayer Leverkusen in the second leg of their Europa League semi-final. He’s still doing it! He hasn’t changed! 28% possession. One shot on target to Leverkusen’s 23. The ball in play for just 54 minutes, despite 14 minutes of injury time. An xG of 0.03. This was a celebration of mourinhismo, a Camp Nou 2010 for the modern age. He had a lead from the first leg, so why should he attack?

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Europa League thoroughbreds Sevilla fought back to reach yet another final as substitute Érik Lamela scored with a fabulous header five minutes into extra time to earn a gritty 2-1 win over Juventus on Thursday, securing a 3-2 aggregate victory.

The Spaniards will bid for a record-extending seventh Europa League title when they face Roma in the final in Budapest on 31 May, after José Mourinho’s side drew 0-0 at Bayer Leverkusen to secure a 1-0 aggregate victory in their semi-final.

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