Jose Mourinho Wants All Of His Real Madrid Players To Lose At Fifa World Cup Go On Holiday

Mourinho is scheduled to join the team at Valdebebas on July 13 to begin Real Madrid’s pre-season. That is six days before the World Cup final on July 19. Players progressing further in the competition will be granted additional recovery leave, inevitably shortening their preparation window with the club — a scenario that the Portuguese tactician, purely for selfish reasons, will want to avoid.

There are currently 13 Real Madrid players in North America for the summer — Vinícius Júnior and Endrick (both Brazil), Kylian Mbappe and Aurélien Tchouaméni (both France), Jude Bellingham (England), Antonio Rüdiger (Germany), Thibaut Courtois (Belgium), Federico Valverde (Uruguay), David Alaba (Austria), Arda Güler (Turkey), Bernardo Silva (Portugal) and Brahim Diaz (Morocco).

Thus far, Güler is the only player not to have qualified for next week’s knockout fixtures, with Turkey eliminated after finishing bottom of Group D. All of the other ten players are either confirmed or overwhelmingly likely to feature in the Round of 32.

Mourinho himself, though, will be keenly tuning in. He admitted he had not particularly enjoyed the World Cup thus far and was looking forward to quality matches in the knockouts.

“Some of the matches, after 10 minutes, I switch off (the TV). I don’t like the feeling. For me, the World Cup is the top of the top. I know socially it means a lot for every country. It means that the world is breathing football. One thing is the social side of it. And another is the football side of it. Scores like 7-1 and 5-1 should not be possible (at the World Cup).”

“I think I am going to start watching properly from the knockout stages. Brazil-Morocco was a great game. Other games, I had some nice dinners and some nice sleeps. I didn’t stay awake at 3 AM (to watch the matches). No chance!”