Tottenham vs Chelsea: Jose Mourinho relishing chance to show Frank Lampard he’s still the master

The former manager-player relationship cooled in 2014 when Lampard eventually moved to Manchester City

Mourinho takes on one of his former players in Lampard this weekend (Getty)

As Jose Mourinho sat in his office this week, preparing and plotting, there was a satisfied realisation that he was exactly where he wanted to be. The nature of this weekend’s fixture is precisely what he lives for, what has enriched his career. It was what he most missed in 11 months out of the game.

There’s first of all the distinctive edge that comes from facing a former club in Chelsea, but also in facing a former player in Frank Lampard. More importantly, though, there’s how that edge actually energises Mourinho to pour everything into his preparation, to work so hard for that key piece of tactical insight that will decide the game. It is what he thrives on.

It is something he remains adept at. Mourinho’s record in individual big games is still very good. His record against former employees, however, is exceptional.

In 11 games, Mourinho has never actually lost to manager who used to play or work for him. All of Andre Villas-Boas, Brendan Rodgers, Aitor Karanka and – just last week – Nuno Espirito Santo struggled against the forensic tactical mind they used to serve.

Mourinho has repeatedly shown the apprentices who the master is. There was one League Cup elimination to Lampard's Derby County, but that was in the sorry last days at United - and still a penalty shoot-out, rather than a defeat.

It is one area where he is quite like Sir Alex Ferguson, given how often the Manchester United great used to best managers like Steve Bruce and Mark Hughes over so many years. The six points every season almost served as an unintended tribute to the big boss, and it’s difficult not to think Ferguson’s personality and psychological presence in their careers conditioned many of the contests.

But this is also what is so distinctive about this weekend’s match.

Lampard has a very different background to former Chelsea backroom coaches like Villas-Boas and Rodgers, a former Porto sub goalkeeper like Nuno, or even a respected Real Madrid centre-half like Karanka.

Lampard was an absolute star in his own right. He is a star Mourinho would of course think he helped make, and the build-up to this game will be filled with all the old stories about telling the midfielder he was the best player in the world while naked in the shower, but Lampard more than carved out his own career too.

In quite literal terms. The words between the two will be warm this week, but the relationship is said to have become cooler since 2014. That was when Mourinho made it clear there was no certain place for Lampard in the new Chelsea team, so the midfielder went on to join Manchester City.

Mourinho celebrates after Spurs snatched a win at Molineux (EPA)

The Portuguese questioned how he could do that, but there is no questioning Lampard’s legacy at Chelsea. He is one of their greats.

That very status is one reason he is back at Stamford Bridge so soon, but also alters the status of this match.

It represents the first time a former Mourinho apprentice is in a higher-profile job than Mourinho. That will be odd for the Spurs boss, and lend a different dynamic to one of these encounters. It’s not the only difference.

There’s also the great contrast in approach, which adds an extra layer of tactical richness to the occasion, as well as the history of the two men.

Unlike Ferguson, whose great skill was adaptation, Mourinho has been so distinctively aligned with one of the two opposing philosophies in the major ideological conflict that has defined most of modern football. He has actually been its most prominent disciple, casting himself as the high priest of reactive football just as Pep Guardiola was evangelising proactive football.

The difference between the two schools is so pronounced that it means anyone following must inherently fall on one side or the other, however narrowly.

Karanka and Nuno are more towards the Mourinho side of the spectrum. Rodgers, Villas-Boas and Lampard are very definitively on Guardiola’s side.

It is understood to have rankled Mourinho in 2011 when Villas-Boas won the Europa League with Porto but used the press conference to preach about the Guardiola philosophy and Sir Bobby Robson. The influence of his former boss at Stamford Bridge was totally omitted. That this came at the height of tension in the Mourinho-Guardiola Clasicos only made it worse.

By the time Mourinho was facing Villas-Boas’ Spurs in 2013-14, in what was actually the first time he’d ever played one of his former players or coaches, the then Chelsea boss took the opportunity for an ice-cold barb.

In one pre-game press conference, the atmosphere in the room at Cobham plummeted, as Mourinho was innocently asked about his and Villas-Boas’ shared history with Robson. Mourinho maintained he didn’t know what the questioner was talking about, and wondered aloud where exactly Villas-Boas had worked with Robson. It was a wilful omission of his own. The truth was the English great had just given Villas-Boas advice as a youth, and nurtured his instinct for coaching. Mourinho wasn’t even going to acknowledge this.

It was an insight into his harsher side. Much more happily, if still a little vengefully, there was the utter relish Mourinho took in spoiling Rodgers’s title charge in that 2-0 win over Liverpool a few months later. There were obviously so many storylines and motivational factors to that fateful game, but sources say Mourinho took particular pleasure in how a defeated Rodgers was left whining about how “anyone can defend” and Chelsea’s “nature”. Liverpool may have previously been scoring for fun, but they still couldn’t defend like a Mourinho team – or beat their defence.

There was none of this for Karanka. Mourinho instead willingly loaned his old Madrid assistant some of his young players when Karanka was at Middlesbrough.

The reality, however, is that it is obvious why Villas-Boas, Rodgers and now Lampard have pursued this route. The Guardiola way has decisively won the argument. It is what dominates modern football, and influences the majority of coaches.

Mourinho and Lampard share a joke last season at Man United vs Derby (Getty)

It has even started to influence Mourinho, given his admission on arriving at Spurs that he had to “go deep” in analysis of his own ways after the failure at United. He has started to incorporate new principles. And yet there is still an old truth.

There remains a significant difference between winning the argument as well as most modern trophies, and then winning individual matches.

Mourinho still rightfully fancies himself as among the best at the latter. He’d back himself to come up with that tactical insight to settle any individual game, to figure out the unseen weaknesses in the opposition that he can repeatedly expose and ruthlessly exploit.

That motivation is only amped up when there is an emotional edge to the match, as is precisely the case with this one.

There’s also the uncomfortable reality for Chelsea that it is sides like Lampard’s that best lend themselves to Mourinho’s preparation. They replicate some of Guardiola’s approach but are nowhere near fully formed, with the gaps becoming even more apparent over the last few weeks. That is what Mourinho will be poring over. There is so much for him to work on.

He will relish the space behind the overburdened N’Golo Kante, especially with such speed in his Spurs team.

That Chelsea are suddenly on such a bad run only adds to this, and plays into him further. It means the onus is really on Lampard and his staff to come up with something different. Just stepping out and stepping up in the usual way would be hopelessly naive, especially against – yes – the old master.

This is something else Mourinho will so enjoy, that thought of pitting his wits against someone he would consider beneath him in the hierarchy.

It is why he so enjoys weeks like these. The wonder is whether he’ll be enjoying himself when that final whistle goes.