Ancelotti: Jose paid for failure to inspire Blues
Former Chelsea boss Carlo Ancelotti has cited a failure to motivate his players as the main reason for Jose Mourinho being sacked from the Stamford Bridge hotseat last week.
Mourinho was axed after a dismal sequence of results which saw the reigning Premier League champions lose nine of their opening 16 matches, leaving the Blues 16th in the table and just one point clear of the relegation zone.
“This is the most difficult job for a coach because within a group, both one that is doing well and one that is doing badly, there are always problems to resolve,” said ex-Italy international Ancelotti.
“When things are going well, there is a risk of relaxation; when things are going badly, obviously there is a loss of confidence. The coach must always keep a good balance in that sense, lifting the confidence levels particularly when things don’t seem to be working.
“It’s a little of this that Mourinho paid for, the fact that the team had not started like last year, when they had tremendous desire to do well after a bad year. This year it was exactly the opposite, he paid for the lack of motivation among the players.”
Former Juventus and Milan boss Ancelotti has managed Paris Saint-Germain and Real Madrid since leaving Chelsea, winning the Champions League during his time at the Santiago Bernabeu. He is set to replace Pep Guardiola when the Spaniard departs the Bundesliga giants in the summer.
Ancelotti won a Premier League and FA Cup double during his first season at Stamford Bridge, the 2009/10 campaign, but was sacked a year later after Sir Alex Ferguson’s Manchester United won the title.