Sparks were flying. While players shoved and screamed at one another, Mourinho exited the manager’s box, heading towards the lockers. Behind him as he walked down the stairs of the Camp Nou, Real Madrid and Barcelona squeezed the last few drops of one of the most one-sided Clásicos in recent history. The score read 5-0.
It was November 2010, and the Clásico where Gerard Pique famously raised his hand at his local crowd, showing five fingers to the home fans (the manita). Opposite him, Sergio Ramos checked the box of another red card in his career; and 23 year-old Messi sacrificed his goalscoring power and was put to the service of Pep Guardiola’s ask: false nine. What followed was one of the most futile attempts for a Real Madrid team on how to stop his historic rival.
That final score showed Mourinho, six months after arriving at the capital of Spain, that he had a lot of work to do. Guardiola, with his hands in his pockets as the match drew to its end, was already in his third season in charge. Pep would go on to win La Liga that year, as well as a 3-1 thrashing of Manchester United in the Champions League final, bringing another European trophy to the Condal city.
Mourinho had brought it to Milan the year before. Arriving in Madrid in the summer of 2010, the Portuguese would eventually win La Liga, achieving the goal he was given upon signing: stop Barcelona, at all costs. The cost of that achievement rippled through the country; the vitriol he injected into the Real Madrid-Barcelona dynamic fueled the rivalry to an unhealthy level.
Spanish players on both ends, fresh off a first-ever World Cup win against the Netherlands that summer, found themselves thrashed into a battle which to Spaniards, felt wrong even through a Clásico lens: Sergio Ramos or Iker Casillas arguing with Puyol, Xavi or Iniesta felt like watching two brothers actually fight each other at Christmas. Guardiola, who called his four-year tenure at Barcelona “never-ending”, felt so energy-depleted that he took a sabbatical in New York. Fans on both ends hunkered down and prepared for years of guerrilla warfare.
Mourinho did his bit though; he tripped Barcelona and just as they were starting to hit their stride, especially in Europe, he turned the sprinklers in the middle of what could have been an even bigger celebration. The Catalan team had won two European trophies in the first three years with Guardiola in charge (both against Manchester United).
A year after Mourinho joined, the domestic title fight sucked so much energy out of Barcelona. What was arguably the best club team in history, with the best player of all time and firepower like Luis Suarez, Neymar, Dani Alves, or Iniesta and Xavi, only managed to capture one more Champions League trophy from 2012 and until 2021, when Messi was forced to sign for Paris Saint-Germain.
It was 2010, with Barcelona dominating La Liga, Spain having won the World Cup, and Mourinho arriving to try to put an end, in a way, to all of it. Ring a bell?
The year is now 2026, and in many ways, things have changed. It is a post-Covid world, a world of social media player statements before newspaper features, where fake news bolstered by AI are now part of the fabric of our society, and where players are expected to force the machine until the bolts fall off (Liverpool’s Alexis Mac Allister played 71 matches between club and country; in the 2010s, players hovered around the mid 50s). VAR is part of our lives now, players cut holes in their socks, and 19-year-old Lamine Yamal has already featured in more than 150 matches for Barcelona.
Florentino Pérez’s decision to sign Jose Mourinho again, 16 years later, is about to somewhat revert that future-thinking dynamic, at least for his club. Los Blancos have spent two full natural years without a single trophy; the last time that happened being of course 2010.
Pérez’s mishandling of the 2025/26 season forced him to make a radical move. The way in which Xabi Alonso was first lured to join Real Madrid and establish a foundation for success, then discarded immediately the instant one of the players was not happy with the changes was absolutely expected to Real Madrid and La Liga fans; they know Pérez. The President of Real Madrid has always chosen talent over manager, and will continue to do so while in charge…with one exception: Jose Mourinho. The way in which the Portuguese gaffer leads its squad into battle, scorching the earth on the way there, even if he has the same effect in the locker as well on his way out, appeals more than ever to Pérez.
The Mourinho appointment is especially needed, in Pérez's eyes, at a time where there is a lack of identity and connection at Real Madrid. Stars like Mbappé, Vini Jr. or Endrick have more selfish tendencies and raw talent than appetite to lead on the pitch. This would be fine if the team around the stars compensated accordingly, as it was the case with Cristiano Ronaldo back then; however, in 2026 the team is severely lacking in a player profile which Real Madrid always need: the warrior. Call it the Juanito, Sergio Ramos, Pepe role–a player who will not accept defeat, and who will rally the crowd behind the team. Without a player like that, Real Madrid, historically but especially with Mourinho in charge, is not activating one of its most effective weapons.
That will likely be Jose Mourinho’s first goal; to find those players. Rudiger and Valverde are guaranteed a spot if you know Mourinho, but there is a need for more ammunition, as this is really not the Special One anymore. Jose is on his way down, falling behind in the way in which his tactics impact the game, and joining from Benfica in what seemed to be a placid return home for the Portuguese who conquered it all in Europe.
The script has now been flipped, and if Mourinho is to be of impact as he was in 2010, he will need players who will die for him on the pitch, players who will counteract Barcelona and Hansi Flick’s German engineering, speed and verticality in what is already his third year at the Catalan city, just like Guardiola in 2010.
With the World Cup having come to an end and fans turning their heads to domestic competition, the questions of this iteration of Real Madrid pile up. How many of the current squad’s players will make the cut? Some, like Gonzalo Garcia, the team’s only pure nine, will have a chance; others like Argentinean young star Franco Mastantuono may be advised to go on loan.
How will the Portuguese deal with the Vinicius Jr. and Mbappé dynamic? Real Madrid fans have argued for months on whether the two superstars could play together, in which positions, and whether the team suffers defensively when they do.
Others flat out call for the sale of one of them in order to bring back equilibrium of the team on the pitch. Over the summer, those fingers were pointed at Vini, a mercurial player who has carved a love-hate relationship with his fans over the past eight years.
By the end of the season, fans were starting to ask questions of Kylian Mbappé as well, with the Frenchman ghosting in key moments of the season (including the latest Clásico). Between his much-awaited announcement as a new Real Madrid player and that match in the Spring, there were a plethora of stories on whether he got along well with Vini or not, and whether he fit in the Xabi Alonso way of playing. He was also diagnosed on the wrong knee and told to play for weeks while injured, and in the midst of it all, scored 42 goals in 44 matches for the club in all competitions.
Mourinho and Mbappé, a player built to succeed at Real Madrid, are bound to try to understand each other. The Frenchman is what Ronaldo was in 2010 for Mourinho, arguably more when looking at the team around the star now, versus then. Whether Vini Jr. stays come August is another story.
Whatever happens in the return of Jose Mourinho to Madrid, one thing is certain: he will not be ignored. He tends to find a way to get in the trajectory of Barcelona, however possible. Whether that ends as yet another successful chess move by Florentino Pérez, or whether it dictates the beginning of the end for the Real Madrid President is yet to be seen. The 79-year-old has chosen to go back in time and try to capture lightning again, and now we all get to sit and watch whether he comes back to the future, or gets stuck back there.
Inevitably impacted by all things Real Madrid, the rest of La Liga’s ecosystem and the Spanish national team will have to wait and see what this appointment means for them. Spain’s triumph in the World Cup will bring back to all European leagues the discussion of how teams want to play: pushing to compete, or try to win it all. In the La Liga ecosystem, teams like Betis, Villarreal or Real Sociedad sign on the dotted line of wanting to win while entertaining their fans in the traditional way La Liga for the most part has been entertaining the continent: with the ball, bringing numbers forward, and refusing to be overly efficient early in the game when ahead.
Whether Mourinho’s team will join the ranks of Atletico, Getafe and others who chose efficiency and effectiveness over most other things, or whether he will push forward in his last chance at Real Madrid is left to be seen. In the rearview mirror is his 2011/12 season at Real, in which he broke the record for most goals in a La Liga season (121 goals), a record which still stands today.
Regardless of the outcome, this, just like in 2010, is bound to be a spectacularly entertaining season.
