The old master outwitted Xabi Alonso in the first leg of their semi-final showdown, with Roma securing a 1-0 win over Bayer Leverkusen at the Stadio Olimpico.
Thursday night’s match pitted the wily Portuguese coach against his former player – who has done an exceptional job at Leverkusen since taking charge in October – and it was the hosts who produced an archetypal Mourinho display to claim a slender advantage.
Roma soaked up plenty of pressure with relative ease and frustrated their opponents before youngster Edoardo Bove netted his first European goal shortly after the hour-mark.
Leverkusen gave an early taste of their threat inside the first minute, with the pace of Moussa Diaby launching a swift counter that eventually saw an unmarked Robert Andrich shoot straight into the clutches of Rui Patricio.
The German side were equally happy to take control of possession and a patient passage of play was suddenly accelerated by a series of quick passes instigated by Florian Wirtz, though he dragged his shot just wide of the far post.
Roma – who seemed quite content to sit back – created little but had the best chance of the first half when a deep free-kick found Roger Ibanez six yards out but the defender’s goal-bound header was brilliantly clawed away by Lukas Hradecky.
That proved to be the most eventful moment of a stodgy first half and the second continued in much the same way, with Leverkusen struggling to get through a packed midfield and defence while Roma’s sporadic moments of menace were limited to set-pieces.
The hosts were starting to get under the skin of their opponents, riling them with niggly fouls and play-acting, and then produced a sucker-punch through 20-year-old Edoardo Bove in the 62nd minute.
He pounced on a loose ball high up the pitch and fed the otherwise peripheral Tammy Abraham, who rolled his marker and fired a shot towards goal; Hradecky could only palm it back into danger and Bove had continued his run into the box, pouncing a second time and firing into the bottom corner.
As Leverkusen sought an equaliser it played into the hands of Roma, who had several half-chances on the break, though the visitors should have been on level terms when Patricio spilled a cross and Jeremie Frimpong saw his follow-up effort blocked on the line.
In the night’s other semi-final, a rather lacklustre Juventus side struck deep into added time in the first leg in Turin to take a 1-1 draw to Seville in a week’s time.
The Italian giants – who are second in Serie A – were undone in the first half by a swift counter-attack that saw Lucas Ocampos gallop down the right wing before pulling the ball back for Youssef En-Nesyri to stroke home.
With time running out, an avalanche of crosses and corners into the Sevilla box eventually saw Paul Pogba nod the ball back across goal for Federico Gatti to bundle the ball over the line from a yard out in the 97th minute, sparking wild scenes of celebration.
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