José Mourinho accuses Antonio Conte of trying to humiliate him
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José Mourinho has accused Chelsea manager Antonio Conte of trying to embarrass him during his return to Stamford Bridge yesterday that ended in a 4-0 defeat for Manchester United. The confrontation occurred after the final whistle when Mourinho appeared to whisper something into Conte's ears.
Reports suggested that the management from both clubs were involved in a confrontation at the end of the game. Mourinho refused to say what he told Conte stating that he didn’t want to share the details of the conversation with the media.
“You know me. I spoke to Conte, not to you. I’m not the kind of guy to come here and share with you things I don’t want to share. What is between me and Antonio is for us ... or up to him to talk if he wants to. That is his problem. I have no comment,” said Mourinho, who suffered the biggest defeat of his English career at Stamford Bridge.
When the question was put to Conte, the Italian gave a similar response stating, “I think that a private conversation must remain private. If someone discover something, OK ... but for me the private conversation remains private."
According to the Guardian, Mourinho told Conte that he should celebrate like that “at 1-0, not at 4-0”, and accused Conte of deliberately attempting to humiliate him in front of the Chelsea fans.
Conte, however, denied that his motivation had been to insult the Portuguese explaining that he wanted to generate a positive response from the Stamford Bridge faithful following Chelsea's best performance under the Italian.
“I think that, today, it was right to call on our fans in a moment when I could only hear the supporters of Manchester United at 4-0. So I called the fans to give the players a great clap after this kind of performance. The players deserved that," the Italian said post-match.
“We live with emotions. If you want to cut the emotions, we can stay at home and I will change jobs. It’s important for our fans to push in every moment of the game. When the players deserve it after this performance, it’s right to receive a great clap from the fans.”
In the much-awaited contest, Manchester United found themselves a goal down after just 30 seconds when Pedro RodrĂguez managed to go through on goal following Smalling's
“We made an incredible defensive mistake, I say incredible in capitals, in the first minute and then the game is different. It is one of those days when you give the advantage to opponents by doing nothing," Mourinho said while giving his thoughts on the performance.
“We put ourselves in a situation where we gave Chelsea the game they wanted to play: the block compact and low, as it was in the second half, and wait for the chances on the counter-attack. Football matches start at 0-0, this match started 1-0.”
Manchester United's problems were compounded by the injury to summer signing Eric Bailly, who limped off after 52 minutes. Bailly has been one of the best performers in the season so far for the Red devils, and according to his manager the injury looks like a "bad one".
“He is injured, I am afraid he is badly injured. In his knee, in the ligament area, he feels that it is really bad,” Mourinho confirmed.
Next up for both clubs is a game in the English League Cup where Chelsea face London rivals West Ham while United have the small matter of the Manchester derby to contend with.
