José Mourinho talked to Vanity Fair in what was his first interview since he officially made his return to Real Madrid. There, he talked about his goals and his vision for the project.
I have to see with my own eyes. I need to understand things that in this moment, I don’t know. What I know in this moment is what I read in the media, what I watch on TV. I need to know the players. It’s not time to talk. It’s time to be very calm and to be analyzing and to communicate and to ask questions and to answer
questions and to [open a] very fluent and honest dialogue.
Because in the end, what I want to do is to help the players to be better, to help the team to be better, to help the club to be better. I’m there to help everybody—not to criticize, not to speak, but to listen. The only thing I can say about Kylian Mbappé is that he’s a phenomenal player, and I’m going to try to help him to be even better than this.
He was also asked about why he decided to come back to the Spanish capital.
The history. Real Madrid’s history you cannot compare with anybody. I think the white shirts, they have something magic. But the reality is that the shirts could be black, green, or blue, it wouldn’t change. Because what made Real Madrid what Real Madrid is, is the history.
The story of Real Madrid is different. It’s not the story of so many amazing players that played for Real Madrid. It’s about the club. It’s about the titles. Of course, there are periods of difficulties. There are periods where they cannot win—like serial winners, like they do all the time. There are always periods where you have to build, you have to rebuild.
But it’s in the Real Madrid DNA, the biggest club in the world now in many areas: socially, economically, in many areas. But in the end, what stays are the titles. And when we speak about Real Madrid, we speak about football history, football heritage.
The rest of the interview mostly goes in-depth about his past as a coach. You can read Vanity Fair’s full interview with Mourinho here.
