Tomorrow, November 25, 2014, Jose Mourinho’s Chelsea will face off against Roberto Di Matteo’s Schalke. The big story surrounding the game is former Chelsea boss Di Matteo, the manager who won Chelsea the Champions League for the first time ever two years ago, will face off against the most successful Chelsea boss ever. However, the ‘Special One’ does not want to focus on that, he wants to focus on winning and hopefully avoid going to the Europa League in case they do not.
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After Di Matteo won the Champions League at Chelsea he managed to put them into the Europa League after a disappointing run of results that led to his dismissal as the Blues boss. Rafa Benitez then took over as interim and won the Europa League to end the catastrophic season Chelsea had considering their losses in the Capital One Cup, the FA Cup, the FIFA Club World Cup, and the Premier League.
In the press conference ahead of the match Mourinho said a few things to the press regarding Di Matteo’s Schalke and his side. When asked about Di Matteo the Blues boss replied:
"“I’m not here to speak about Di Matteo. I am here to speak about the game. If you want to do that I am ready.”"
He also said that he was not at Chelsea when they won the Champions League under the Italian.
Mourinho is also focused on the win that would put them into the next round in the UCL in order to take the pressure off his players so that they can focus on the Premier League and their matches in December.
"“We have two matches to do that (qualify for the Champions League knockout stages) but obviously it will be better for us to qualify on Tuesday,” “We have so many matches in December so it’s better if you can qualify and avoid that pressure. Obviously that would be very good for us but the reality is that we need points and we will try and do that tomorrow."
The former Madrid boss has also clearly stated that a loss might lead to his team getting put into the Europa League and that he wants to avoid that at all costs.
"“I have repeated that to my players already that going into the Europa League is something that would be very disappointing for us.”“Going to the Europa League would be very bad, very bad for the team because a team gets better and the evolution gets faster when you play in the best competitions against the best teams.”"
To Mourinho the Europa League is a huge step down from the Champions League and would be a distraction if Chelsea indeed were put into it following a possible unfortunate run of form.
For now both Mourinho and his players are focused on the game vs the Schalke in Gelsenkirchen and are hopeful of remaining unbeaten in all competitions thus far this season.
Source: SkySports.com