Jose Mourinho was today speaking in Montreal at a pre-match press conference ahead of our first pre -season game of the season in the International Champions Cup vs New York Red Bulls.
Mourinho discussed the transfer window, our training base in Montreal and the future of one of our players. He started by expressing the feelings of the group and reassured fans the club will be ready to find a replacement if a player leaves the club.
We are a very happy group. The players feel it. We are a club in peace. We are a club where our future has to be bright.
“At the moment we don’t want players. It’s simple. We must be ready because it looks like the market is open, and because it looks like the market is open there is always a risk somebody comes for one of our players or one of our players shows an interest in leaving. We must be ready to answer to it.”
Mourinho then all but confirmed that former Atletico Madrid left back Filipe Luis is likely to go back to the Spanish side. Filipe Luis hasn’t enjoyed his best year of his career at Chelsea due to Azpilicueta being chosen over him, and it seems he’s happy to move back to his former club.
In this moment we need a left-back because I think we are selling Filipe Luis now or tomorrow. We need to go the market, we need to find a club that accepts a bid before 31 August, and we are going for a left-back. In other positions we have no space.
Finally Mourinho told the media why the club has chosen Montreal as their training base.
I don’t want to travel. I want to stay in the same place all the time. We made one exception today to travel and sleep one night away. We want to have a base.
“We wanted to find a place where we can have a base and to train every day, to sleep in the same hotel every day – to arrive, open the bags and only close them when we go back to London.”
“It’s a new training ground, so we knew the pitch would be good. All the conditions are good for us.”