Reaction as Jose Mourinho leaves Chelsea
Jose Mourinho has left Chelsea for a second time just months after winning a third Barclays Premier League title at the club.
Here is some of the reaction to the news from people involved in football:
Cesc Fabregas thanked him for everything, saying: "Thank you for all you have done for me. I owe you a lot and we will all miss you. Good luck in the future and i know you will be back soon."
Former Liverpool player and manager Graeme Souness said on Sky Sports News: “Part of me is shocked and part of me isn’t shocked.
“You’d think his track record would buy him a bit of time, but I think on the other side of the coin you look at what’s happened at Chelsea this year and there has to be something fundamentally wrong.
“There are more than two or three people not pulling their weight, for whatever reason.
“I think he’s lost his dressing room and some of the major players in the dressing room have given up on him. If you fall out with two or three of the main men in the dressing room, that would quickly become all of the dressing room.
“If you look at the quality of players Chelsea have right now, where they are in the league is ridiculous – they should not be down there.”
Sunderland boss Sam Allardyce said in his press conference ahead of Saturday's game at Chelsea: “I'm sad to see Jose go.
“I’ve got to know him quite well. He’s a great manager with great character and he is a loss to the Barclays Premier League.
“Only time will tell if there’s a better performance or reaction from the players. It’d be a pretty bad indictment on the players if they actually go and perform a lot better than they have done recently just because Jose has lost his job.
“At the end of the day, because of the underachievement that’s happened at Chelsea, even a great man and a great manager like Jose has lost his job.
“That shows you we’re all in the business of results and if you don’t get those results, it doesn’t matter how good or popular we are, if we don’t get it right we’ll lose our position.”
Former Arsenal and England defender Martin Keown said on BBC Radio 5 live: ``This has almost been an accident waiting to happen.
“If you go back to October, he was talking about rats in the camp and that he couldn’t name his team before games for fear that it’d find its way into the press.
“He didn’t seem stable right from the off this season. He was on a campaign where he fell out of love with his players.
“It’s quite incredible and astonishing to see the champions capitulate in the last game against Leicester. I saw players that weren’t really giving everything.”
Ex-Gunners and England forward Paul Merson said on Sky Sports News: “I’m not really surprised because of the position they’re in (16th).
“They’ve had no injuries – this is the same team that won it last year.
“LVG (Louis van Gaal) will be looking behind him. If it doesn’t go well for Man United in the next week or two, I think they might look and think, ’One of the best managers in the world of football is available. Let’s get him’.”
Former Arsenal and France striker Thierry Henry said: ``It's kind of a mixed reaction because I was kind of expecting it because Chelsea needed to change something and spark a reaction from the players.
“But also on the contrary, they’re sacking the best manager in their history and also one of the best ever in the game.
“I think you have to hold the players accountable for what’s been happening recently. But you can’t sack all the players so the thing teams usually do is sack the manager.”
Downing Street responded to news of Mourinho’s departure, with Prime Minister David Cameron’s spokesman saying: “The Prime Minister is always sad to see anyone lose their job, but it’s worth reflecting on this week’s labour market statistics, which demonstrated that there are over 740,000 vacancies in the UK economy, thanks to the excellent stewardship of the economy.”
