Mourinho hits out at 'fake' league table
Chelsea boss Jose Mourinho believes it is unacceptable that those playing for the Premier League title and to avoid relegation will not have completed the same number of games until the final week of the season.
The Blues recovered from defeats at Crystal Palace and Paris St Germain with a 3-0 win over Stoke to return to the top of the Premier League – albeit having played a game more than Liverpool and two more than Manchester City, who play Aston Villa in a rearranged fixture on the final Wednesday of the campaign.
Bottom-of-the-table Sunderland, meanwhile, have three games in hand over Cardiff, Fulham and Norwich, who are all battling to avoid the drop.
Mourinho wrote off Chelsea’s title challenge after the Selhurst Park loss and maintains the table is “fake”, particularly without parity over games played.
The Portuguese said: “The situation is the same. The table is again fake. The table is again with lots of matches in hand.
“You look to the top part of the table and, some teams, they have more matches than others. You look to the relegation area and it’s exactly the same.
“In the top of the league we cannot say we need X points to be champions.
“If you look at the relegation area, Fulham or Cardiff or Norwich, they cannot say ’we need this number of points to survive’, because they don’t know, because Sunderland have matches in hand.
“This, in the best league in the world, I don’t think is the best image we are giving and it’s not the best situation.
“To play matches in hand in the last week of the season, I don’t think is adapted to this top football country.”
Premier League chief executive Richard Scudamore was in the Stamford Bridge media conference room while Mourinho was speaking.
