Not so special: Mourinho solely to blame for Chelsea elimination

The Portuguese manager faulted his players' concentration in defeat against PSG, but his overall strategy was poor on the night and hamstrung his side unnecessarily

There are so many intangibles in football, and not everything is down to the influence of the men on the touchline. It was former Argentina international Jorge Valdano who said that, no matter the level of control-freakishness involved, one coach’s brain cannot compete with the infinite possibilities of eleven men in the heat of a football game.
That has not stopped managers from trying though, seeking to minimise risk and maximise reward. Somewhat incongruously, those who prefer to manage this way, poring over every bit of minutiae, are referred to as modern managers, and exact a high price. None more so than Jose Mourinho.
The Chelsea boss is one of the finest managers of the last decade, boasting two Champions League crowns and league titles in every nation he’s managed in. In spite of his record, he divides opinion like no other. There is no right way to play football, and to argue the merits of aesthetics over pragmatism is a fool’s errand, but after the Blues’ elimination at the hands of PSG last night, it is clear that extreme pragmatism has its limits.

Chelsea | Out-thought, out-muscled, out-played by PSG
For a club of Chelsea’s standing to play 120 minutes against PSG, 90 of those against ten men, and fail to muster significant attacking intent, is simply mind-boggling. The Stamford Bridge side came into the tie as favourites, and enforced their position of comparative advantage with a score-draw away at Parc des Princes.
This, in spite of the fact the Blues looked a hollow shell in the French capital, sleepwalking through the match in a daze brought on by fatigue and niggling injuries. If the French champions could not dispatch them on their own turf, then what hope was there for the second leg?
Laurent Blanc’s side came to Stamford Bridge and played with a swagger and assurance befitting the name of the competition, even after Zlatan Ibrahimovic’s somewhat harsh red card. To say they deserved to win would be an understatement, even the normally pugnacious Mourinho could not deny them the compliment.
“The individual performances were not good enough and when you concede two goals from two corners it’s about lack of concentration, lack or responsibility to cope with the markers and the space you have to control,” said the Portuguese manager.
“When a team cannot cope with the pressure of being one player more and playing at home, we couldn’t cope with that pressure.”
Exactly that, though Mourinho may have been better served pointing the finger at himself. At no point did his Chelsea seek to control the game or assert themselves as a superior outfit. Matter of fact, over two legs, Chelsea never for any stretch played like the favourites they were.
In the end, it was he who bottled it, he who could not handle the pressure of being the favourite. It is he who has to service a cloying need to always be the underdog, the young upstart trying to crash a party he is being barred from by ‘powers that be’. At 52, managing a club with the muscle Chelsea can boast of, the shtick is starting to get really old.

Mourinho | We've heard it all before...
It’s easy to question the quality of Chelsea’s defending on both corners, but underneath it all, the Special One cannot spare himself. Why his team found themselves under pressure that late in the game when they should have been comfortably ahead does not hold up to scrutiny.
Roman Abramovich, in attendance at Stamford Bridge, cannot have been nodding in approval. For the second time in as many seasons, Mourinho has contrived to get an uber-talented, expensively-assembled team to play less than the sum of their parts.
Last year’s semi-final saw the Blues come away with a goalless draw from Vicente Calderon, stringent in their desire to afford their hosts no space whatsoever and offering no attacking threat. Mourinho’s hubristic willingness to wager all on the home leg was cruelly exposed by Atletico Madrid, who showed no such inferiority complex in London, and ran out deserved 3-1 winners.
For a coach like Mourinho to make the same mistake twice in two years is damning. For this error to be a strategic one, an area where he exercises his greatest strength, is downright criminal. It speaks of a deep-seated, primordial need to instinctively suppress spectacle and expressionism.
That is the one big drawback of pragmatism, it rarely elevates.
On a night when Chelsea needed to take control and find another level, they instead let the game descend into a scrap, one from which their visitors emerged smelling of roses. Chelsea, champions-elect of England, slunk away with their tails between their legs, reeking of opprobrium and needless toil.