LONDON, (Reuters) – Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho stoked up his war of words with Manuel Pellegrini yesterday, questioning the Manchester City manager’s sums and calling on the Chilean’s talismanic midfielder Yaya Toure to be suspended.
Mourinho, who will have Fernando Torres fit to return at West Bromwich Albion today after a three-week layoff with a knee problem, took the mind games to a new level on the eve of the Premier League tussle at The Hawthorns.
Chelsea went to the top of the table with a 3-0 win over Newcastle United on Saturday, one point ahead of Arsenal and two in front of City.
Mourinho has said repeatedly that he views City’s expensive squad as the title favourites but Pellegrini recently pointed out that it is Chelsea who have spent the most money in the last decade and also in last month’s transfer window.
“What I’d like to say is that the other day Pellegrini made some comments about the money we have spent,” Mourinho told a news conference.
“I think he’s a fantastic coach who I respect a lot and on top of that he’s an engineer,” said the Portuguese referring to the fact the City manager studied engineering at university.
“I don’t think an engineer needs a calculator to work out we sold Juan Mata for 37 million pounds ($60.66 million) last month and Kevin De Bruyne for 18 million.
“That’s 55 million pounds, more or less. We bought Nemanja Matic for 21 million and Mohamed Salah for 11 million. That’s 55 million minus 32 million so Chelsea in this transfer window are at 23 million plus.
“It’s easy to understand that we are working with Financial Fair Play…there are no arguments against that.”
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Mourinho, who often provokes and antagonises other managers with barbed comments and memorably said last week that “everything I say or do is mind games”, hinted City were not operating within the same Financial Fair Play guidelines.
“This is what we are doing, others aren’t doing the same,” said the Chelsea manager.
“We are building a team for the next decade if possible and City have a team to win now because they don’t have a team for 10 years.”
Mourinho then turned his attentions to Ivory Coast international Toure who aimed an off-the-ball kick at Norwich City striker Ricky van Wolfswinkel in Saturday’s 0-0 draw at Carrow Road.
Asked about Manchester City’s prospects if Toure were cited by the Football Association on video evidence and subsequently banned, he replied: “I don’t understand why you say ‘if’.
“If you say ‘if’ and he is not suspended the message is clear for all players.
“It means that it doesn’t matter about the cameras, doesn’t matter about the consequences, if the referee doesn’t see it they can do it (but) normally the FA defends football and fair play.”
