Alan Brazil: Chelsea sacking Jose Mourinho would be mad… he can turn it around

JOSE MOURINHO will never have known scrutiny like it.

The last three months have been a nightmare for the Special One and he has struggled to wake up from it.

Whenever it seemed like his Chelsea side may have turned the corner, another bump in the road threw them back off course.

On the pitch, results have been dreadful.

Off the pitch, it has been just as bad.

Mourinho, normally so calm, so unflappable, so dismissive, has seemingly disintegrated.

His responses to reasonable questions have been snippy, his body-language has been pored over.

The conclusion? He is under massive pressure. And he knows it.

Yesterday’s home defeat by Liverpool was Chelsea’s sixth defeat in 11 Premier League games this season.

That’s sacking material for most managers.

But I reckon talk of his impending dismissal is completely ridiculous.

The bottom line is that Chelsea and owner Roman Abramovich would be mad to sack him.

This is Jose Mourinho we’re talking about one of the greatest managers of all time.

Okay, this is a situation he’s not used to, but he’s got what it takes to turn it around.

Things have happened off the field that haven’t helped, not least the situation with former club doctor Eva Carneiro.

Public opinion is very much against Mourinho on that one.

Most people believe he shouldn’t have reacted the way he did when Carneiro took the field to treat Eden Hazard against Swansea. Sacking her, they say, was way over the score.

But and this won’t be popular I can understand why he was annoyed.

He was thinking ahead, recognising his team would be a man down at a crucial point of the game.

What came next has caused a serious storm, and it has turned people against Jose.

A lot has been made of his demeanour in press conferences, even of his appearance.

Should Chelsea say goodbye to Jose? Yes NoPeople have suggested Jose is having some sort of breakdown.

I’m sorry, but that’s ridiculous.

This is a man who is a master manipulator of the media, a man who plays that side of the game just as well as the on-field side.

Do people really think his reactions, however seemingly over the top, have not been calculated?

I had a one-to-one chat with Jose not too long ago on a day he was doing wall-to-wall interviews and he was completely in control of our conversation.

He knew what he wanted to say, he knew how he wanted to say it, and he delivered his message to the letter.

The suggestion that he would turn up at a press conference only to lose his cool is one I can’t help but laugh at.

Okay, results have been poor, very poor. And with each defeat, the prospect of Champions League football at Stamford Bridge becomes more and more remote.

But Jose is made of sterner stuff than he’s being given credit for. And I’d bet my bottom dollar on him turning things around.

It remains to be seen, however, if Roman Abramovich is prepared to wait for that.