When it comes to pure spectacle most people seem to have preferred the old pre-facelift model José Mourinho. Albeit it has been a few years since we saw that cheerfully acerbic entertainer, back in the days when Mourinho could be bothered to smile, play to the gallery, spook an opponent with his bastardish charm and generally floss, brush, pomade and change out of his pyjamas.
Personally, I quite like the new version. Gloomy José, the shell-suited grinch, has his own appeal. Mourinho may be a more grizzled figure these days, resembling in his public appearances a man being held captive in a nuclear bunker and occasionally forced by his captors to appear unshaven before the cameras in a sweat-stinking tracksuit, blinking into the lights, and making a series of caustic, veiled remarks in front of a board covered in adverts. But his pronouncements are often just as funny, in a downbeat way; and when he’s not in agenda-driven-nonsense mode, just as astute.
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