Mourinho's 10 most special spats with managers and other football figures PART 2

source: mirrorfootball.co.uk

4) Mourinho v Claudio Ranieri (August 2008)
Shortly after arriving in Italy, Mourinho took aim at Ranieri for his failure to win trophies at Chelsea.

Ranieri: "I don't like the way he stirs up controversies from time to time. Our frictions have nothing to do with the fact that he replaced me at Chelsea.

Mourinho: "I studied Italian five hours a day for many months to ensure I could communicate with the players, media and fans. Ranieri had been in England for five years and still struggled to say 'good morning' and 'good afternoon'.

Ranieri: "Unlike Mourinho I don’t need to win to be sure about what I am doing."

Mourinho: "I guess he's right with what he said. I am very demanding of myself and I have to win to be sure of things. This is why I have won so many trophies in my career. Ranieri on the other hand has the mentality of someone who doesn't need to win. He is almost 70 years old. He has won a Supercup and another small trophy and he is too old to change his mentality. He's old and he hasn't won anything."

3) Mourinho v Lo Monaco (September 2008)
Speaking at the post-match press conference follwoing his side's defeat of Catania, Mourinho incurred the wrath of Catania's sporting director Pietro Lo Monaco.

Mourinho: "We could have won that game 5-1 easily. In fact, I could have played in goal for Inter and we still would have won."

Lo Monaco: "Somebody who says such things has no respect for anyone, neither for his opponents nor for the country in which he is a guest. Mourinho is, plain and simple, the kind of guy who should get smashed in the teeth"

Mourinho: "Lo Monaco? I don’t know him. I know of Tibetan monks [Monaco means 'monk' in Italian], I know Bayern Munich [Bayern Monaco in Italian], I know the Monaco Grand Prix... I don’t know any others. If this guy wants to earn free publicity by talking about me, he'd better pay me. adidas feature me in their adverts, but they pay me a lot of money to do that. I don't get paid to help this Lo Monaco get in the papers."

2) Mourinho v Ranieri II and the Italian media (March 2009)
After Inter are awarded a dodgy penalty during a 3-3 draw with Roma, Juve manager Claudio Ranieri agreed with the general consensus it wasn't a penalty.

Mourinho: "I don't like intellectual prostitution, I like intellectual honesty. There has been great intellectual manipulation over the last few days to manipulate public opinion. We haven't talked about a Roma side with great players, lots of players I wanted to have with me, that will finish the season with zero titles. We haven't talked about Milan, who will finish the season with zero titles. We haven't talked about Juventus, who have won lots of points with refereeing mistakes.

1) Mourinho v Marcello Lippi (August 2009)
Mourinho was not best pleased after Italy's coach predicted Juve would win the Scudetto.

Mourinho: "It's normal that journalists give their opinion and say 'Juve will win the title'. It's normal that Juventus directors and the coach say it, but it's the first time I've read of a national coach saying these things. Even if he wants that, even if he thinks that, it's a lack of respect. I still want to think that it's not true. It's the first time that I've read of a national coach, a person with such a great responsibility, saying such things. I'm expecting a reaction from national football."

Lippi: "I'm sorry if Mourinho interpreted my comment in that way: it was simply a prediction, one of the many theories that are bandied about before the start of the championship. I give thousands of interviews. For three years I've been saying that Inter is the best team. Yesterday, in a interview that covered many things, I gave a quick reply to a question about the upcoming championship and I said that I thought Juventus would win. On many other occasions I've said good things about other teams, and I think things have been exaggerated in this case. Mourinho seemed to me to be an intelligent person, and I'm sorry that he interpreted my comment differently: but there is no problem. I said what I said..."

Mourinho: "It's of little relevance if in previous interviews, a year ago or a month ago, Lippi said good things about Inter or other clubs. Yesterday evening the top person in Italian football gave a precise indication about the outcome of a championship that has yet to start. This does not seem right to me, and I say this calmly as a club manager to the national coach. I still believe that Lippi, being the national team coach, should not make predictions on Serie A. I don't think that Fabio Capello or Vicente Del Bosque would make predictions on the Premier League or La Liga. They are smart..."