Inter’s former striker Adriano has revealed he left the Nerazzurri because Jose Mourinho didn’t want him.
Adriano spent one season playing under Mourinho after the Special One was appointed in the summer of 2008, in which Inter won a fourth consecutive Serie A title.
However, the pair never saw eye to eye and eventually the Brazilian felt he had no choice but depart the club before the treble campaign.
“Mourinho saw once that I was down and asked me to train separately,” Adriano recalled in an interview with ESPN during Arena SBT (via FcInter1908.it) on Tuesday.
“I spent two weeks doing that and then I came back into the group.
“One Thursday I learned that I would be called up for the next match, but then the next day that wasn’t the case and I got angry.”
Adriano was clearly popular among his teammates but this made no difference to his future, as the former forward explained subsequently.
“There was a trip to Rome once and I wasn’t included,” he recalled.
“I spoke with Javier Zanetti and Ivan Cordoba, thinking already that I would be leaving (in the summer).
“All the players came to my house after that to ask me to stay, but I knew I couldn’t stay because he (Mourinho) would have got involved.”
Adriano joined Inter from Flamengo in 2001 and went on to make 177 appearances in all competitions for the Nerazzurri, scoring 74 goals.
During his eight-year stint with the club, he also had loan spells with Fiorentina, Parma and Sao Paulo in Brazil, and he touched on his spell with Sao Paolo in 2008.
“I wanted to stay at Sao Paulo (after the loan finished), but when I called Massimo Moratti he told me: ‘No, come back here’.”
