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Don’t think Mourinho doesn’t have a plan for Falcao

By on June 19, 2015

The episode of Andriy Schevchenko could have hung over Jose Mourinho’s career. It was a high-profile, big-money flop, still the seventh most expensive transfer to an English club, almost a decade on. At the time, it was an EPL record.

But Schevchenko only ever made forty-eight appearances for Chelsea and worse, scored just nine times. He cost over three millions pounds per goal, just from transfer fees alone.

And while the signing was famously not Mourinho’s decision, the failure could have fallen on his shoulders easily.  Yet it didn’t scar Mourinho’s career, because Mourinho wouldn’t let it. By chance or design, Mourinho had his high-profile falling-out with Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich and the burden of the failed transfer fell rightfully on Abramovich’s shoulders in the eyes of most. The Portuguese manager kept with his reputation intact, and then enhanced it significantly thanks to subsequent trophies Internazionale and Real Madrid, including winning the Champions League, a feat that continues to allude him at Chelsea.

Since Mourinho rejoined Chelsea, the word “pragmatic” has been thrown around a lot. Aside from his penchant for counter-attacking football, he’s also taken a somewhat more tactical approach to the transfer market, and also appears to have more say in the market than during his previous reign. He has the money to make high profile signings and doesn’t shy away from them, but he knows what he wants.  The names matter less than they did with Shevchenko and Torres, to name two, especially when Mourinho seeks a role player.

Radamel Falcao is set to join Chelsea on loan, after a medical is completed, on similar conditions. At the age of twenty-nine and on the back of a flop loan spell at Manchester United, he has lost most of the market appeal he generated during his Atletico Madrid days. Similar to Shevchenko, he cost 5.8 million euros per goal and nearly a million per appearance at United, scoring just four times in the second half of the season.

But Mourinho knows what he wants and as he is after Falcao, so don’t think he won’t have a plan for him, even if it’s simply to replace Didier Drogba as a backup to Diego Costa. A plus is that Falcao’s poor season as Manchester United reportedly has almost halved his potential wage bill for this upcoming season.

Simply the fact that Falcao has Costa to tire the defenses will certainly make him look better, and a title-winning squad behind him certainly doesn’t hurt. Even Lionel Messi will score more goals with Barcelona than a lesser side; especially given his hand-in-glove fit into a tiki-taka style of play. Chelsea’s tactics resemble that of Atletico Madrid, where Falcao last shined.

Mourinho wants to remain the “special one” and that demands a certain acumen in the transfer market as well as on the training ground.  He’ll personally want Falcao’s move to work out. Whatever the situation, Falcao is unlikely to prove a high profile flop. At least not on Mourinho’s bill.

Photo credit: DSanchez17 on Flickr

About Alex Morgan

Alex Morgan, founder of Football Every Day, lives and breaths football from the West Coast of the United States in California. Aside from founding Football Every Day in January of 2013, Alex has also launched his own journalism career and hopes to help others do the same with FBED. He covers the San Jose Earthquakes as a beat reporter for QuakesTalk.com and his work has also been featured in the BBC's Match of the Day Magazine.