This was a drama of violence and beauty, played on and off the pitch.
The machine-gunned post-match allegations that scattered from the Mourinho’s mouth were not just the latest in an enduring campaign of assault on FC Barcelona’s integrity; it was a rallying call for hooligans.
This is a man that from his days at Chelsea has dismissed every victory against him by Barca as the result of play acting and weak refereeing. But last night Mourinho’s surpassed himself by questioning Barca’s achievements under Pep Guardiola and implying that it’s all been part of a big fix by UEFA.
While in free-flow in alleging his conspiracy, Mourinho seemed unable to produce any proof other than alluding to questionable circumstantial evidence obscured by subjectivity. Thus we are meant to believe that the German referee came out into the Bernabeu with the deliberate intent of penalising Real Madrid, that Pep Guardiola’s pre-match talk was focused on telling his players to dive and protest and pick a fight at half-time, and that UEFA somehow wants FC Barcelona in the Champions League final and not Real Madrid, because their players are sponsored by UNICEF and Qatar.
The point is that whether what Mourinho says is true or not is not really the issue. He says what he says as a tactic to divert and destabilise. On and off the pitch Mourinho’s is football’s agent provocateur– he plants seeds of insidious rumour and incites his players to play rough, as a matter of style.
He was loved at Chelsea, and is similarly admired by many Real Madrid fans, for Mourinho’s personifies aspects of their culture and that of Spanish national football of times past when the aggression of La Furia was much admired. In Spain, it has taken him less that a season to confront and undermine the harmony, dignity, and respect achieved in Spanish football thanks to Vicente del Bosque, coming dangerously close instead to provoking gang warfare among players of two great clubs. Last night Mourinho greeted each flare-up with a sardonic smile, as if things had gone to plan. He also claimed that Pepe’s sending off after his foot-up challenge on Alves-reminiscent of de Jong’s un red-carded kick on Alonso in the World Cup final- was unjustified.
Mourinho is a nasty winner and an even nastier loser. His arrogance denies him the ability to admit to his own shortcomings as a human being and tactician. This contrasted with Guardiola’s refusal to be provoked, and to see to it that his players persevere through the distracting sideshows, to produce football played at its most creative and noble-even if we saw only flashes of it last night. FC Barcelona’s overwhelming possession of the ball for much of the game was a testimony to its patient endeavour as much to the negativity implicit in Mourinho’s fortification.
True, Messi’s goals came after Real Madrid were down to ten men. But both goals were sublime moments, epitomising between them Guardiola’s real achievement at Barca – his own enduring nobility, and faith that football at its best is poetry in motion. Thanks to Messi, there was also magic. And Barca have been there before, not because of any fix, but because of their talent.
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