Jose Mourinho has reflected on his time in charge of Inter as he appeared in the first episode of DAZN show Linea Diletta.
“At Inter I found an incredible family that made me happy every day. My connection with the fans was the fruit of our results: when you win you’re happy,” he began.
“We won things and created empathy, which is still there: in London I still find Interisti who hug me.”
“In Italy the way football is experienced every day is incredible. It’s very Latin. Inter are a family. Someone’s still a player, someone’s still a Coach, someone’s still there. It’s a permanent holiday: but we’re there, as if it were yesterday.”
He then spoke on the players he had at his disposal for his highly successful stint in charge.
“It’s not possible to do something special if it’s just the Coach: we had a special group and a special family. They brought out the best in me. I helped many of them get to the top, but many of them succeeded with me.
“What I said before the Barcelona tie came from my heart: when I won my first Champions League, my son was four years old and that season he told me he wanted to win the Champions League again so he could remember it.
“I talked about it with the players. We were talking about everyone’s children: maybe it was the last chance for them to win it.
“We put in that feeling where we could’ve played for five hours and Barcelona would never have won.”
The Portuguese coach, who is currently out of work also discussed Zlatan Ibrahimovic’s departure and the signing of Wesley Sneijder.
“Zlatan is fantastic, but he has incredible self-esteem. He said he wanted to leave to win the Champions League, and at that moment I told him spontaneously: “Maybe we will win it.” The team has transformed the fear of losing a great player like Zlatan into being able to do it without him.
“Sneijder’s signing? It wasn’t easy but Oriali and I did everything we could. We put pressure on the president, who was a fan of his too and at the last moment he arrived. Two days later he played the derby.”
