Mourinho lands in Real hotseat

Multi-trophy winning Jose Mourinho landed in the Real Madrid hotseat on Friday after he was unveiled as the Spanish giants’ new coach.

His unveiling came after Real reached a deal with Inter Milan, whom the Portuguese coach this month guided to the Champions League trophy, on his transfer from the Italian club.

Real and Inter “reached an agreement today that Jose Mourinho is the new coach of Real Madrid”, the club said on its website.

“The agreement between the two clubs came after a meeting held this afternoon in Milan with Inter chairman Massimo Moratti and Real Madrid president Florentino Perez.”

Mourinho will be presented to fans at Real’s Santiago Bernabeu stadium on Monday at 1pm (1100 GMT), the club said.

The brief statement gave no further details. But Perez was in Milan to try to unblock a 16-million-euro stumbling block — the severance fee in Mourinho’s contract allowing him to quit his post at Inter two years early.

Moratti, who said Real had agreed to honour the buy-out clause in full, blamed Italy for driving Mourinho away and stressed that the door would always be open for a return.

“For me this changes nothing with regards him because he worked hard, seriously, with great animation and he won a lot,” Moratti said in reference to Inter also bagging the Serie A title twice and the Italian Cup during Mourinho’s time.

“This does not even ruin a miniscule amount of the esteem with which I hold him nor the affection I have for the person.

“It’s his problem but I think that he’s leaving Italy more than leaving Inter.

“Maybe he has wounds that didn’t heal and then there is his character which pushes him in search of new adventures.

“For those who are great the door, if not wide open, remains always slightly ajar and ready to be opened fully.”

Real opened the way for Mourinho after they sacked coach Manuel Pellegrini on Wednesday.

The Chilean left after just one season in charge in which Real failed to pick up any silverware despite splashing out more than 250 million euros on new talent last year, including Cristiano Ronaldo and Kaka.

They finished runners-up to arch rivals Barcelona in the league, exited the Champions League at the last-16 stage and spectacularly crashed out of the King’s Cup to third division Alcorcon.

Mourinho becomes Real’s 10th coach in as many seasons, during a period when their great rivals Barcelona have had just two with better results and titles.

Over the last eight years Mourinho has won six league titles in three different countries – two each in Portugal, England and Italy – with Porto, Chelsea and Inter.

He won two Champions League crowns, the UEFA Cup and five domestic cups.

This season he guided Inter to an historic treble of league, Cup and Champions League — the first by an Italian team.

He is incredibly popular in Madrid after Inter eliminated Barcelona in the Champions League semi-finals.