“You little shit, I brought you here.”
We can’t be 100 per cent sure but we imagine Jose Mourinho’s recent conversation with Cesc Fabregas went something like that.
The Spaniard has been revealed – by The Secret Footballer, no less – to be the man heading up the supposed mini-revolt against the Chelsea manager. It is a claim that Fabregas has since denied.
Mourinho has been enjoying a turbulent third season in his second stint at Stamford Bridge and, with results failing to improve, more and more stories and controversies are doing the rounds.
The Secret Footballer – a former Premier League player who made his name penning an insightful column with The Guardian and a number of bestselling books reporting anonymous stories from the professional world of football – reckons he has it on good authority that Cesc Fabregas is the man said to be railing against the boss and whipping up a dressing room storm in the process.
In a new piece, The Secret Footballer says that it all started with physio-gate and “hanging pyhsio Jon Fearn and club doctor Eva Carneiro out to dry in public.
“Managers pick on staff and players all the time in order to make a wider point to the squad and remind them who is in charge,” he writes.
“But in this case, Mourinho could not have got it more wrong. Fearn and Carniero are loved at Chelsea.”
And, now, the problems run deeper with the players reportedly hating their style of play and Cesc Fabregas is said to be at the head of the rumblings.
“I have it on the best authority possible that the players have told the manager that they hate the way they play.
“They hate the way they have to sit back against inferior opposition; they hate the way they aren’t allowed to express themselves.
“I’m told that Cesc Fabregas is the leader of that mini-revolt. And as a player, you do things like this when you know you are in the right.
“You try your luck. Why not?
It’s your way of saying to the manager: ‘You can either listen to us, and give the go ahead to change and give us what we want, or we’ll keep serving you up the same old shit and embarrass you.'”