Generally open and honest about his thoughts to the media, Cheslea manager Jose Mourinho is not shy about making headlines.
Today, he’s hinted that FIFA could have corrupted the 2012 World Coach of the Year award as he finished in second place to Vicente del Bosque.
He uttered similar comments in 2013 but now with the news of FIFA corruption, starting with the arrests of several officials in Zurich, his insight looks to have some backing behind it.
Del Bosque gained 34.1 percent of the votes to Mourinho’s 20.1 percent to win the accolade which is voted on by players, coaches and members of FIFA.
[TRANSFERS: Papadopoulos completes Bayer Leverkusen switch]
Concluding with “obviously something happened,” the Portuguese boss profiles the situation below, per ESPN FC.“In 2012, I was one of the three finalists and when I was told I was finishing second with a few votes behind the first, it looked normal to me.
“But then the votes were made public. And my former player, a national team captain, called me, ‘Mister, there is something wrong. Because obviously, obviously, I gave you the vote, then in the list they put another coach’s name and that was not me.’
“A few minutes later my Portuguese friend, a national team coach, called me, ‘Mister, don’t believe what you see in the list because obviously I vote for you.’
“And a few minutes later I got a message from another national coach, ‘they changed my vote.'Who changed the vote? His federation? FIFA? Who?...It is not a drama. A drama is other things but at that time I said, ‘from this moment I don’t go back’ because obviously something happened.’'
This quote from Mourinho is interesting but assuming FIFA did rig this vote, what would Del Bosque have to do with anything? Maybe it could have been a personal preference of a certain billionaire, debating on funding FIFA in some way, to have Del Bosque win it.
The FIFA money circle, after all, must be fairly extensive.
