Former Chelsea manager Andre Villas-Boas has lashed out at the English media for painting him out to be something that he isn’t.
Villas-Boas’ forgettable spell at Stamford Bridge promised so much, and delivered so little. He was supposed to be the second coming of Jose Mourinho, but was anything but.
It certainly didn’t help the Portuguese’s legacy that Chelsea went on to win the Champions League in the season that he was dismissed as manager. He’ll try and take credit for a portion of that, no doubt.
Or perhaps we are being ignorant, to consider him arrogant, or obsessed, or anything of the kind. He appears intent on distancing himself with the things he was formerly branded.
AVB is quoted by talkSPORT saying:
“The thing is that, sometimes, in England, people sold an image of me that’s got nothing to do with me. They portrayed me as arrogant, distant. When I first arrived at Tottenham, we won a few games at the start. Things go well and I win Manager of the Month. Then a newspaper says, ‘Andre has changed so much that now he’s in Harrods at 2pm. He’s not obsessed with work’. It was my day off! I was there on my day off. The journalist who wrote that saw me there by chance. It’s just incredible.”
He only ever acted in his best interests as Chelsea manager and things didn’t change when he went to Spurs. Perhaps he ought to look within himself for the problem.
Every high-profile figure in this country gets treated in this manner. He clearly wasn’t cut out to deal with the challenges he faced, hence why he never returned.
