Jose Mourinho 'blinded' Andre Villas-Boas as former Chelsea manager reveals he was 'in love' with the manager
Villas-Boas wanted to learn everything he could while working for Mourinho, but realised that it had a major impact on his own managerial career
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Your support makes all the difference.Former Chelsea and Tottenham manager Andre Villas-Boas was so “in love” with Jose Mourinho’s skills as a manager that he became blinded by him when he started his own coaching career.
Villas-Boas, a free agent after leaving Zenit St Petersburg this summer, worked with Mourinho at both Porto and Chelsea before following in his footsteps as a head coach. After making his managerial debut at Portuguese side Academica, Villas-Boas took up roles with Porto, Chelsea and Spurs before ending up in Russia.
But while the current Manchester United manager Mourinho has enjoyed phenomenal success in the Premier League, Villas-Boas cannot boast the same record, and he revealed on Tuesday that his determination to be just like Mourinho had an impact on his later career.
Speaking at the ASPIRE4SPORT and Aspire Academy Global Summit in Amsterdam, Villas-Boas said: "In my formative moments, working with Jose was the best time of my life. I was able to lean to many things and working with him takes you to another level.
"You fall in love with him and he becomes your idol. I wanted to be like him, know everything that he knew and absorb all the information he was giving.
"Then you fall on the wrong side of Jose and that's when things change and you realise that you've been blinded by someone. He has this fascinating capability of getting the best out of you, which has good or bad consequences for people.
"My consequences were that as a result of the argument or disagreement we had, I started my coaching career."
Villas-Boas was criticised during his ill-fated time at Stamford Bridge as he lost the support of the dressing room – something that would eventually strike Mourinho before his sacking last season – but the Portuguese has admitted that his big breakthrough came too soon in his career.
"The Chelsea experience was too much too soon," he added. "I wasn't flexible as a manager at that time. I was communicative, but I wasn't flexible in my approach. At Tottenham I learnt to be different."
Although Villas-Boas enjoyed a more successful time at White Hart Lane, he was still sacked by Spurs chairman Daniel Levy in 2013 that paved the way for his move to Russia to join Zenit, where he secured the Russian Premier League title in 2014/15 and the Russian Cup last season in his final match in charge of the club.
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