Mourinho – Friedkin, showdown after the defeat of Roma in the Europa League

Before Monday. “Because from Monday I go on vacation and when I’m on vacation I just rest”, the specification of Josè Mourinho, an employee on the Roma payroll with a salary of 7.5 million net per season until 30 June 2024. The public request of a meeting with the property, anticipated by the private one formally forwarded to the new CEO Lina Souloukou, was very direct. Otherwise, with the Special on vacation and the Friedkins wrapped up in their immutable silence, the risk is that the minuet could go on for quite a while, slowing down planning for the next Giallorossi season, the fifth in a row without the coveted and munificent participation in the Champions League. A nice economic damage of almost 50 million

and image, after almost 900 million invested since 2020, for the Friedkin family, in any case the bestower of the third largest salary in Serie A.

Frost at the Puskas Arena

In Budapest, while tears welled from the eyes of the almost 20,000 Roman fans at the Puskas Arena and Sevilla celebrated its seventh Europa League, the yellow and red family hanging out dirty laundry in the square. Mourinho’s cold greeting to Ryan Friedkin, who took the stage together with the bigwigs of UEFA and the Andalusian president Castro for the award ceremony (last year, in the victory of the Conference in Tirana, the inconvenience fell to his father Dan), and then no other contact. The CEO Souloukou, freshly hired in yellow and red, followed the ceremonial “remotely” on one of the screens in the area reserved for receiving the media and VIPs; Friedkin junior and senior, after the duties dictated by UEFA, marched away from the stadium dark-faced without passing by to greet the team and the coach, the absolute protagonist after the match between throwing a medal at a child leaving the pitch early, request for a summit with the club in the press room and the curtain with the referee Taylor and his assistants in the parking lot of the Puskas Arena. Mourinho, on the eve, had already announced his intentions to his “boys from Budapest”: “If they don’t give me the guarantees I ask for, I could leave”.

Mourino’s requests and the knots on the market

But what is Special One asking for, in any case bound by another year of contract and for now without concrete offers from other teams – by your admission – in hand? Clarity, according to his very personal parameters. The one he didn’t perceive, perhaps receiving an unwelcome response, when last December he forwarded the proposal for Portugal’s coach to the Friedkins’ knowledge. Which, from the Mourinhian point of view, translates into an even more competitive squad, in a more belligerent society with the referees and the palace and in the sharing of precise communication and operational strategies. Mou, despite knowing the constraints of the Financial Fair Play to which Roma is linked (under the settlement agreement regime with UEFA), no longer wants to settle for a “7 million market for tickets”: a different idea from the one cultivated in Trigoria , and perhaps also in Houston, of a squad, also prepared according to the wishes of the coach (Dybala, Matic and Wijnaldum), absolutely worthy of grabbing a place in the Champions League. Indirectly, the position of the head of the sports area Tiago Pinto could also end up on the table, probed in recent months by West Ham and Tottenham. On the market, to rake in the necessary money to reinvest in strengthening, this season’s opaque Abraham and Ibanez could end up. The midfielder Aouar from Lyon has already been booked on a free transfer: work is still underway for N’Dicka, central defender of Eintracht Frankfurt. With Wijnaldum destined to say goodbye at the end of the loan, many positions remain to be evaluated: on all those of Dybala, who can theoretically be released by paying the 12 million clause for foreign countries and 20 for Italy (even if Roma have room to cancel and tie), and also of Belotti, expiring on 30 June. However, everything revolves around the fate of the Special One: he remains convinced and motivated at Roma, he remains only because he is bound by a contract (similar script to many third and last melancholy Mourinho years in a club) or an offer from a third party Do you free everyone from the impasse and force Roma to switch to another coach (Nagelsmann and Thiago Motta, two of the profiles you’ve been eyeing)? Mourinho, disqualified for the last round of the championship which is worth the Europa League for Roma and salvation for Spezia, would like to know by Monday.