José Mourinho rather likes himself. You may have noticed. It is not just that he takes himself terribly seriously, but that his personality demands we do so also. His pronouncements are issued with the lofty imperiousness of a philosopher, his jokes with the hauteur of a monarch.
When he celebrates — as he did again in the wake of Inter Milan’s Champions League triumph over Bayern Munich on Saturday — he does so with a keen eye for the theatre of his own aggrandisement. It all says “me, me, me”. It all says “I am the Special One”.
When he uttered those immortal words soon after taking up the Chelsea job, we marvelled not so much at his impudence as at his conviction. This was not somebody spouting off for effect or to conceal his insecurities; it was somebody revelling in his innermost certitude. We all regard Mourinho as a great manager, but even as he has grown in our estimation over the months and years, we have been certain of just one thing: Mourinho’s estimation of himself is even higher.
His traits as a manager are well documented. His preparation is meticulous, his planning minute and his ability to pick the right targets in the transfer market almost without peer. But his greatest asset is a capacity to get the best out of his players, to command their assent, to animate their passion.
Other football managers have often marvelled about how his teams are so consistently united by a common purpose. That was the key to Inter’s defeat of Barcelona in the semi-finals and was in vivid evidence again in their victory over Bayern. But this was no coincidence. It has been part and parcel of all Mourinho’s teams since his early days at Porto.
And it invites the thought that the narcissism of Mourinho is not a personality defect in an otherwise brilliant coaching repertoire, but the quintessence of his managerial genius. Mourinho without narcissism would be a like a gigolo without sex drive.
He would be a man with a clipboard but without animus. He would have all the right ideas and meticulous tactical information, but would lack the force of character to instil them into the hearts and minds of his players.
Those who spent time with Adolf Hitler talked of the phenomenon of “personality compulsion”. The dictator was a fanatic for the cause of Nazism, but his ultimate fanaticism was for the cult of his own self. His complete inner certainty commanded assent — that or violent disagreement. After all, there is no middle ground when confronting any person — whether a football manager or a fascist — whose beliefs are not tempered by self-doubt.
Take a wide-enough perspective and you will see that a splash of fanaticism is a key ingredient of leadership in any situation characterised by instability. Football teams are bastions of instability, with players coming and going, and managers perpetually a game or two away from the sack. They are sport’s answer to nation states at times of war and revolution. That is why they produce dictatorial figures with large personalities and gargantuan egos.
It hardly needs mentioning that Sir Alex Ferguson fits into this paradigm. His ability to command disparate millionaires like extensions of his own will is the stuff of legend. It is not just the likes of Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes who talk of how Ferguson’s force of personality regulates the club, but also those such as David Beckham who departed on poor terms. Ferguson’s tendency is more towards megalomania than narcissism, but the consequences are the same. The central tenet of life at Manchester United is the primacy of Ferguson.
Many have talked of the stubbornness of Arsène Wenger, but believing in the ascendancy of one’s philosophy, even in the teeth of the evidence, is the cornerstone of conviction. Leon Festinger created a new branch of social psychology by revealing the ways in which deep convictions are immune to objections — even sensible ones — and how they possess almost hypnotic power. When Wenger holds forth about his methods, he convinces his players just as the masses were convinced by the fanaticism of the early evangelists.
But it is difficult to think of any manager more convinced of his own philosophy, his own genius, his own destiny, than Mourinho.
When he looks in the mirror, he sees a thing of rare and unexplored brilliance. He wants to win with Real Madrid, then perhaps with Chelsea again, then who knows where else? His ego will not be sated until the whole world shares his opinion of himself. That is to say, never.
Yet even as we contemplate the self-certainty of these great managers, we must also acknowledge that essential dash of cunning. When Ferguson confronted the volatile genius of Eric Cantona, he had a choice. He could get rid of the dissident Frenchman, and lose his greatest asset, or he could temper the writ of his dictatorship. In a rare piece of subservience, Ferguson gave Cantona leeway while continuing his iron rule over the rest of the team.
And therein lies the wafer-thin difference between the true fanatic and the great leader. Both wield convictions that stray beyond the limits of logic. Both embody the excesses of complete self-assurance. But any leader who wants to survive beyond the initial conquest of personality must occasionally embrace the muddy waters of pragmatism.
To do so without losing the faith of the disciples is, perhaps, the greatest trick of all.
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