‘He loves training’ – Spurs forward defends Mourinho over public training fiasco

Tottenham forward Lucas Moura has defended Jose Mourinho over his decision to ignore the government guidelines hold an outdoor training session with Tanguy Ndombele last week.

The Spurs head coach has been on the receiving end of plenty of lot of criticism (The Sun) after being pictured with the Frenchman at Hadley Common.

Moura, however, insisted that the Portuguese coach had the best of intentions at heart and that he was just keen to ensure that the players are fit.

The Brazilian revealed that the 57-year-old was keeping track of the player’s progress on a regular basis.

Speaking to Sky Sports, Moura said: “Mourinho, of course, cares about our fitness. He loves football, he loves training, so I think he wanted to see everyone and make sure everyone is taking care about our body shape.

“For sure, he’s taking care about himself as well. I don’t think it (the park session) was a big problem. He knows and he’s a very professional guy.

“Mourinho goes to the training centre every day with his staff and all professionals who give us the training sessions. And we see everyone in the online application at 11 am every day.

“It’s a good time, it’s a good moment for everyone, but the training session is normally hard. But it’s good for us because we don’t know when we will be back. But it’s a good time and Mourinho watches the session and speaks with us every day.”

While the forward admitted that he desperately misses playing football and meeting his teammates on a regular basis, he insisted that the game has to take a back seat for the moment as society tries to battle the spread of COVID-19.

When asked about the prospect of football returning behind closed doors, Moura added: “I don’t know, to be honest, if it is safe because maybe I have the virus without having symptoms. Then I can touch a team-mate or a rival spread it and we don’t know.

“I’m not sure what is best to do. If it’s to play or not to play, play with fans or without, it’s a hard situation to decide. I’m not sure it’s safe to pay even without fans.

“I love to play football. As I told you, I miss my routine. I miss my team-mates, I miss the training ground, I miss playing games and seeing everyone at the stadium. I miss this feeling. But to be honest it’s difficult to know when we will be back because the situation isn’t under control.

“A lot of people have coronavirus now and we know it’s easy to spread it. A lot of people are infected. We really hope to be back very soon, but life and health are the most important thing. But of course, I miss playing football.”

Spurs Web Opinion

It wasn’t the smartest of decisions by Mourinho to train publicly but it was clearly blown out of proportion by the press. Most Spurs fans that I talked to didn’t seem too upset about the incident and some saw it as a positive that Jose was spending time on the pitch with Ndombele.

Keep up to date with all the latest Tottenham news and opinion by following SpursWeb’s Facebook, Twitter and Instagram accounts.

Related Topics

Have something to tell us about this article? Let us know