Mourinho's Real Madrid Return Begins vs Inter — SkimNews
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- Jose Mourinho returns to the Real Madrid Champions League dugout on Tuesday (20:00 BST) against Inter Milan, the club he led to a 2-0 Champions League final victory over Bayern Munich at the Bernabeu in 2010 before joining Real days later.
- Mourinho's first Real Madrid spell (2010-2013) delivered the 2011 Copa del Rey, the 2012 La Liga, and three consecutive Champions League semi-finals, but he departed in 2013 without winning the European Cup the club demanded.
- Real Madrid lost to Real Betis at the weekend before the Inter game, with Mourinho attributing the defeat to a failure to convert attacking play into goals; Kylian Mbappe saw an injury-time penalty saved by Betis keeper Alvaro Valles.
- Mbappe dismissed the idea that Real Madrid's two trophyless seasons add pressure to Mourinho's Champions League return, saying his experience at the club tells him not to think too long-term.
- Mourinho described the current Real squad as finding the "best club in the world" after what he called a "very complicated season," and said the new chapter is unrelated to his 2010-2013 spell.
- Mourinho was presented with a wrapped garden sprinkler by an Italian journalist at his pre-match press conference, a nod to the iconic 2010 Camp Nou celebration when sprinklers went off as Inter reached the final against Barcelona.
Why it matters: Mourinho's first Champions League run at Real Madrid ended in three semi-final exits without a 10th European Cup; the club spent two seasons trophyless, and Mbappe's late penalty miss against Betis exposed the same attacking conversion problem Mourinho himself flagged. With Inter — the team that gave him his second European Cup — as the opener, the match is an early benchmark for whether Mourinho can finally deliver the trophy he could not in his first spell.
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