Adebayor warns Mourinho on Mbappé: he'll listen, not heed | OneFootball

Emmanuel Adebayor knows José Mourinho, and he knows Real Madrid. He also knows what it means to walk into a dressing room full of stars and egos. He did so in January 2011, when he arrived on loan from Manchester City and found himself alongside Cristiano Ronaldo, Karim Benzema and Gonzalo Higuaín. That is why it is especially interesting to hear what he has to say now.

The Togolese striker analysed the problems of the current Real Madrid in an interview with Flashscore and focused on an uncomfortable issue: the authority Mourinho can exercise over players like Kylian Mbappé. Adebayor believes the Frenchman will respect the Portuguese coach. Whether he will always obey him is a very different matter.

"When Mourinho was Mourinho..."

"Mbappé will listen because it’s Mourinho, but he won’t fully do as he’s told. When Mourinho was Mourinho, Mbappé was young," explains Adebayor, who points out an important difference compared with the coach he knew fifteen years ago: that Mourinho arrived at the Santiago Bernabéu after dominating the European elite.

"His ego was bigger than all of ours", he recalls. Now, however, he believes that "his power is no longer what it used to be" because the Portuguese has had "five or six difficult years". A generation like Mbappé’s knows Mourinho’s legend perfectly well, but it did not experience the coach who had just won the treble with Inter.

Harmony in the dressing room?

Adebayor also does not fully buy the image of harmony among Madrid’s stars. "When you have players like Mbappé, Vinicius, Jude Bellingham, it becomes an ego problem. Don’t let them fool you, they try to show on television that they get on well, but that isn’t always the case," he says.

Precisely because he knows him, Manolito expects a strong reaction after the defeat to Atlético. He is convinced that Mourinho will speak to the president during the break and then stand in front of his players. "It’s either you or me. Either they sack me or I’ll get rid of you first," Adebayor imagines his message will be.

Fifteen years later, the problem may not be whether Mourinho still knows how to climb onto the table. Adebayor’s doubt is how many still lift their heads when he does.

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇪🇸 here.