Turkish football: Racism accusation against Mourinho: The case of the star coach

The “Special One” – that was once. With the dazzling and successful career of the star coach José Mourinho, Turkey is currently going downhill.

After the Istanbul derby between Master Galatasaray and Mourinho’s new Club Fenerbahce (0-0), the opponent announced on Monday evening to show the 62-year-old Portuguese for racism at the FIFA World Association and the European Football Union UEFA. Mourinho had accused coaches and substitute players of the opponent of jumping around on the edge of the field after a controversial scene “like monkeys”.

What, in addition to this serious and immediately rejected by Fenerbahce’s club, the accusation almost rejected: Galatasaray’s chief coach Okan Buruk mocked Mourinho at the press conference after the game as “The Crying One” (the crying): “He cries on the field. He cries outside. And As if that weren’t enough, he also goes into the Referee cabin and cry there too.

The serious allegations against Mourinho and the handling of the two largest Turkish clubs suggest: This escalation from Monday evening has a long history.

Galatasaray won the Turkish championship five times in the past ten years. The last Süper-Lig title from Fenerbahce, on the other hand, was eleven years ago. In order to finally break through this dominance of the great rival, the club from the Asian part of Istanbul before this season hired the highly decorated Mourinho-at least Champions League winner with FC Porto and Inter Milan as well as national champions with FC Chelsea, Inter and Real Madrid .

But it doesn’t run as desired in terms of sport. “Gala” is still six points ahead of “Fener” in the table. So Mourinho has been doing what has been annoying in England and Italy in recent years: he relocates the argument from the field to the media – with constant criticism of the referees. With the accusation of the preference for Galatasaray. With controversial scenes from the games of the rival, which he shares afterwards on social networks.

One consequence of this is that the Istanbul derby in the Galatasaray stadium was led by a top referee from abroad this time. And when Mourinho praised the experienced World Cup, EM and Champions League-referee Slavko Vincic from Slovenia, the controversial monkey quote also fell.

“After the swallow in the first minute and its bank, who jumped around like monkeys: With a Turkish referee you would have had a yellow card after a minute and after five minutes” he should have replaced one of his players, said Mourinho. He pursued the rowing arm movements with which his colleague Okan Buruk had protested on the edge of the field in the scene in question.

The club management of Galatasaray reacted to this on the same evening. “Since the beginning of his work in Turkey, Fenerbahçe coach José Mourinho has repeatedly made derogatory statements to the Turkish people,” says the club’s statement. “Today, his discourse beyond mere immoral comments has developed into a clearly inhumane rhetoric.” These are “racist statements”. Hence the “official complaints at UEFA and FIFA”.

But regardless of the outcome of this procedure, it also shows that it is less and less the football teacher Mourinho, who still causes a stir. But above all the provocateur, “the gifted populist of world football”, as the “Spiegel” calls him.

Tactically, the most successful coach of the 2000s has long since lost the connection to old rivals such as Pep Guardiola (Manchester City), Carlo Ancelotti (Real Madrid) or Simone Inzaghi (Inter Milan). The folk tribun Mourinho plays with the emotions of the fan masses, the coach Mourinho only lets destructive destruction football playing: this is the pattern of the past few years. A European League victory with Manchester United (2017), Conference League success with AS Rome (2022): More recently no longer jumped out.

In Rome, Mourinho was released in nine in the table a year ago. For his team it was such a liberation that it won 12 of the following 17 games. “The Special One”, as in his presentation in 2004 at Chelsea FC: This is no longer called Mourinho himself.