Former Roma striker Antonio Cassano has launched a venemous attack on current manager , saying he has never been a great coach and does not know how to set up a team.
It is not exactly a disastrous season for Roma so far, sitting third in Serie A and still in the , although a title challenge domestically is already off the table as they are 16 points behind league-leaders Napoli.
Cassano was also enraged to see his former side beaten in the Coppa Italia earlier this week by Cremonese who sit bottom of Serie A with just eight points from 21 games.
The former Italy forward lays the blame at the feet of Mourinho, and a couple of the signings that the Portuguese manager has made at Roma.
Speaking on Christian Vieiri’s , Cassano said: ‘Mourinho has never been a great coach, he just knew how to play the media and was a great communicator.
‘He is good at dealing with strong players, not ones who aren’t very good. It’s too easy to just be friendly with great players.
‘It is just a disaster upon a disaster at Roma. He got them to spend money on and Rui Patricio, they were his decisions.
‘The other day, that performance made me want to be sick. He doesn’t know how to set out a team. Even with your second-string squad, you need to beat Cremonese.’
Roma returned to winning ways on Saturday by beating Empoli 2-0 in Serie A, with England international Tammy Abraham back on the score sheet as he netted his sixth Serie A goal of the season.
Mourinho rested a number of first team players in the cup defeat to Cremonese, but brought them back for the league win this weekend.
‘I think that if this team plays against Cremonese, we win and we’re in the semi-final of the Coppa Italia,’ said Mourinho said. ‘But then we wouldn’t have won today. This is our reality. We always do our best, we work hard.
‘Today, before the game, I told the players that we have to go onto the pitch with a backpack full of the frustration and sadness of the last game, but we can’t expect anyone to help. Just us.
‘For the first time I went on the pitch with them in the warm-up and our feeling was exactly this: it’s just us. The truth is that we do our best. And as I always say, when you give your best, you can’t give more. We always give our best.
‘I think day after day. I could have left in December, and I didn’t leave, I stayed here. And this is my life. Sometimes it seems like we’re in trouble, in the relegation zone, but we’re there, we’re at the top, with all those teams that are very strong. But that’s okay.’
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