WHY SAY ANYTHING?

(Jose sits with his medical team and ponders the future!)

Jose Mourinho is in limbo. If we believe all the reports then he wants the Manchester United job. If we believe further reports then the reason he isn’t the current manager is because of Sir Bobby Charlton. He is old school and doesn’t like the idea of the club’s manager being headline news most of the season.

If it was only for all the good things, he would probably be fine with it but Jose, as is his wont, tends to make the news for virtually everything he does and, let’s be honest, it isn’t always the stuff used to set as examples for schoolboys to follow.

From arguments with his medical team to arguments with his players, Jose isn’t too fussy and even manages to include other managers in his occasional outbursts.

Arsene Wenger, Sam Allardyce and Manuel Pellegrini to name but three, have all crept into Mourinho’s radar of people he loves to hate.

The problem for United is actually quite simple. They have tried David Moyes. A likeable, non-confrontational Scot who, some people thought, would be ideal for United. He wasn’t because the job was too big for him.

So they are now trying van Gaal. After all, he is a winner, more like the “United type” than Moyes. He knows what it is like to win Championships and Champions Leagues titles.

Having spent £258 million on new recruits you could be forgiven for thinking that van Gaal would be doing somewhat better than his predecessor. He isn’t! His record is almost identical to that of Moyes except he didn’t last as long in the Champion’s League, with Moyes having taken United to the quarter final stage.

This all means that van Gaal will probably resign at the end of this season, rather than wait until the end of his contract or risk being fired. He hasn’t “made the difference” and Sir Bobby may not be quite so averse to Mourinho for next season having seen what has happened with choices he no doubt endorsed.

As it would appear that Pep Guardiola will go to Manchester City and that Diego Simeone doesn’t appear to be going anywhere, then the timing could, for once, be right for Mourinho. He may finally be offered the job he craves. This time, Sir Bobby Charlton will not be able to argue as strongly against the appointment as before.

If not then his alternatives are limited. Like Guardiola, he doesn’t want to test himself at a smaller club with less money because, also like Guardiola, his ego states that he has nothing to prove. This means he is only available for the biggest jobs in Europe.

Real Madrid have Zinedine Zidane. He will be fine with the fans and, providing he wins La Liga every other year and the Champions League in between, he will be fine with Florentino Perez. So he could be there a while.

Bayern Munich will appoint Carlo Ancelotti at the end of the season, to replace Pep Guardiola who, as previously mentioned, will hotfoot it to the Etihad. So there’s another two teams ruled out.

Even Laurent Blanc has got Paris Saint-Germain playing well and winning things, so he doesn’t look like departing any time soon.

How about a return to Italy? Again, it’s unlikely as Roberto Mancini is doing fine at Mourinho’s first and, some would say, only Italian love, Inter Milan.

So all this leaves him twiddling his thumbs on holiday in China. Does he know what is going to happen? Has he already been offered a job for next season? Is it just a case of wait and see? Mourinho does not strike me as being the most patient individual on the planet but I think he is now in a situation whereby he doesn’t have a choice.

Whatever happens don’t miss the next exciting episode of “Jose Mourinho’s career”, brought to you exclusively by the man himself with generous assistance from the European Press.