Mr Unbelievable. Chris Kamara

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СКАЧАТЬ that rule was José Mourinho. He was great with me when he was in charge at Chelsea. Well, he was for a while. It eventually turned sour with Sky and The Special One after an incident involving Chelsea midfielder Michael Essien, but we’ll come to that in a moment. We first met before a Carling Cup tie at Fulham and seemed to hit it off.

      ‘I like you very much,’ he said, shaking my hand. ‘I like listening to you and Andy Gray. You educate the public on the game.’

      It was really uplifting hearing it from a football man like him. I could hardly get the headphones on my swelling bonce afterwards. We struck up a great friendship immediately and he always made me feel at home whenever I visited Stamford Bridge. José loved Soccer AM and its silly humour and I remember we really took the mickey on the show while he was serving a European touchline ban after an ugly bust-up with referee Anders Frisk.

      It happened during a Champions League game with Barcelona in 2005–06. José had been unhappy with the way the game had been handled and made some derogatory comments about Frisk. UEFA were not happy and banned José from the touchline for two games. They even called him an ‘enemy of football’. The punishment also prevented him from having any contact with his players once they had arrived at the ground, which meant he effectively had to stay away from the game completely.

      That didn’t stop José from influencing the match. On the evening of Chelsea’s next Champions League fixture, he sat at home (well, that’s what we were told). On the bench, his coaching staff were wearing woolly hats; it was cold, but not that cold. I watched the game on the telly and noticed that Steve Clarke, José’s assistant, was continually touching his ear and relaying information to the players immediately afterwards. I put two and two together and came up with a scam in which José was keeping touch with his staff via high-tech headsets. I wasn’t the only one with the same theory. It was also just the sort of clever stunt that José would pull. He denied the rumours when they were floated in the press the next day, but it looked so obvious. It was even suggested that José had been smuggled into the ground in a skip, to get as close to the action as possible, without being visible to UEFA. Nothing was actually proven and the club have never admitted it.

      By luck I was at Chelsea the following weekend with Soccer AM, the Saturday-morning show then presented by Tim Lovejoy and Helen Chamberlain. José had given us permission to use the dressing-rooms for filming, as he always did, but I had a surprise up my sleeve. Chelsea’s kit man, Billy Blood, had given me an official woolly hat. I went into the home dugout to film a report, and the hat was pulled over my head but a mobile phone was stuck to the fabric with Sellotape, mimicking the antics from the week before. When our cameras went live, I could hardly stop laughing as I did an impression of Chelsea’s backroom staff that night. I heard José took it in good spirits, too.

      Sadly, our relationship changed when Sky’s use of the action replay annoyed José. It happened during a Champions League game between Chelsea and Liverpool when Michael Essien clashed with Liverpool’s Dietmar Hamann at Stamford Bridge. It was an ugly tackle and it was shown over and over again on Sky Sports News. Once it was out there, UEFA had to act, and Essien was banned retrospectively. Because it was the Champions League, the incident was televised on different stations around the planet, but for some reason José personally blamed Sky for Essien’s suspension. He cooled noticeably whenever our cameras were on him and his attitude towards me changed. He wasn’t as friendly or welcoming as he had been in the past.

      He was entitled to do whatever he wanted, of course, but the truth is, I was disappointed. José was a breath of fresh air when he first arrived from Porto and he was a joy to work with. I’ll be honest, I thought the sun shone out of his backside. The Michael Essien incident put a big, grey cloud in the way, which was a real shame.

      

      A less imposing character was the former referee Paul Alcock. If that name rings bells it’s because he was the Premiership ref who was infamously pushed over by the former Sheffield Wednesday and West Ham hothead (and brilliant striker, it has to be said), Paolo Di Canio. It was a fiery situation. Paolo had been sent off during a game between Wednesday and Arsenal and he reacted to the red card by pushing the ref over. Alcock had barely been touched, but judging by his tumble, you’d have thought he’d been thumped by Mike Tyson. The fall was so exaggerated it was hilarious.

      Our paths crossed for the first time several years later when Alcock was the referee’s assessor for an FA Cup tie between Southend and non-league Canvey Island. I was there as co-commentator for Sky Sports. It should have been a fairly run-of-the-mill evening, but trouble started as we waited for the teams to come out for the warm-up. I had spotted Alcock chatting to my colleague commentator Martin Tyler in the tunnel. When they’d finished I couldn’t help myself and I gave Alcock a little playful shove. I thought it was really funny, but he was stunned. He lost it.

      ‘You are a joke!’ he screamed, in a funny high-pitched squeal. ‘A chuffing disgrace’ (only he didn’t say ‘chuffing’).

      Alcock then turned to John Smart, Sky’s senior floor manager (the grey-haired bloke you’ll always see at live games, sticking his thumb up on the touchline so the ref knows when to start a match). ‘I want him reported because that’s out of order,’ he shouted, not seeing the funny side. Thankfully, John ignored him and Alcock shuffled off to the referees’ room in a right strop. I turned to John, completely confused by the reaction.

      ‘What the hell was all that about?’ I asked. Before I could get an answer, the door to the referees’ room reopened. A red-faced Alcock emerged and kicked off again.

      ‘Four years ago that happened and I have been getting it in the neck ever since,’ he yelled, clearly upset.

      I raised my hands in apology. ‘Paul, if it upset you, I’m sorry.’

      ‘Apology accepted,’ he said, sulking off to his room.

      I couldn’t believe it. If anything, Alcock should have been dining out on the Di Canio incident. I obviously touched a raw nerve that night, but I’ll say one thing, he did well to stand on his feet in the Canvey tunnel because it was a fair push I gave him. Far harder than the one Di Canio dished out.

      Paul Alcock wasn’t the only person I annoyed that night. Stan Collymore was also in the ground because he was hoping to make a comeback as a player-manager at Southend. Stan had played for Villa and Liverpool and was one hell of a striker in his day, but word from Roots Hall suggested a successful return to the game was unlikely. I told Sky Sports the sad news.

      ‘I’m not sure he is going to get the job,’ I said. ‘And it would be difficult for him to get back to being even half the player he was. Even then he looked bloated and overweight and I don’t know what Southend would be letting themselves in for.’

      Stan was really annoyed by my analysis. My mobile bleeped shortly afterwards.

      ‘You’re out of order about my weight,’ read the text. ‘Thanks for your support. Stan.’

      I sent a reply, telling Stan that I always said it as I saw it and that I hoped there were no hard feelings.

      

      Gérard Houllier, the Liverpool boss between 1998 and 2004, was somebody I shared a prickly relationship with. It all started during Sheffield United’s memorable Worthington Cup run in 2003, when they were eventually tied with Liverpool in the semi-finals. In a lively first leg at Bramall Lane there was a spicy touchline spat with United gaffer Neil Warnock – a self-confessed trouble-starter – and Liverpool’s assistant manager (and Soccer Saturday panellist) Phil Thompson. Somehow, I got caught in the crossfire.

      A row between those СКАЧАТЬ