Jose Mourinho’s dramatic return to Real Madrid is all but sealed after the club’s season descended into training ground-scrap chaos this week.
On Thursday Madrid midfielder Aurelien Tchouameni put team-mate Fede Valverde in hospital following a fight in the dressing room.
The bust-up was one of a series of confrontations between warring players and president Florentino Perez is set-on bringing back Mourinho who coached the club between 2010 and 2013.
The 63-year-old Benfica manager believes he has unfinished business at Madrid where he lost three consecutive Champions League semi-finals.
He would reject any advances from Chelsea this summer to go back to London for a third time in favour of a return to Spain and Perez wants Mourinho presented before the World Cup.
Mourinho will also be given the final word on the decision as to whether to sell Tchouameni or Valverde this summer.
Jose Mourinho is set to seal a dramatic return as Real Madrid manager this summer
Real Madrid’s season descended into training ground chaos this week after Aurelien Tchouameni put team-mate Fede Valverde, left, in hospital following a dressing room fight
Both players have been fined €500,000 (£430,000) for the dressing room fight (Valverde earns 20m a season, and Tchouameni 15m). And both would have Premier League suitors if their coexistence into next season is seen as non-viable.
Tchouameni could have joined Liverpool before he moved to Madrid in 2022 and would likely reunite with his former coach Xabi Alonso if he moved there.
Valverde, scored three goals against Manchester City in the Champions League this season and would attract interest from both Manchester clubs if he moved on.
Valverde will miss Sunday’s ‘El Clasico’ against Barcelona because of concussion protocol following the brawl; Tchouameni must wait to see if he is selected for the game that will see Barcelona, and Marcus Rashford, crowned Spanish champions if they avoid defeat.
Players speaking off the record described this week’s incident at Madrid’s Valdebebas training ground between Valverde and Tchouameni as ‘the worst they had known’.
The two had argued at the end of Wednesday’s training session over a series of over-the-top challenges. Tchouameni tried to make peace on Thursday morning but Valverde refused the offer and there followed another ill-tempered training session with more hot-headed challenges flying in, this time largely from Valverde.
The Uruguayan harangued the Frenchman constantly repeating the claim that he had leaked the previous day’s training ground trouble to the Spanish media.
The two then fought in the dressing room at the end of the session with the Uruguayan taken to hospital with a cut forehead in what the club subsequently said was the result of a fall against a table and not the player being struck by his team-mate.
Alvaro Arbeloa has not possessed the authority necessary to heal dressing room divisions
Much of the squad tension goes back to the dismissal of Xabi Alonso in January, with Vinicius Jr among his biggest dressing room enemies and protested his substitution in El Clasico
Kylian Mbappe and Vinicius Jr are on different sides of a dressing room divide at Real Madrid
The altercations between Valverde and Tchouameni came after Antonio Rudiger was caught on camera slapping Madrid kitman ‘Manolin’ on the training ground, and was accused of striking teammate Alvaro Carreras, an incident confirmed by Carreras in a subsequent social media post.
Much of the squad tension goes back to the dismissal of Xabi Alonso in January and the failures of his replacement Alvaro Arbeloa.
There were players that backed Alonso and players that wanted him gone and that division has deepened in light of Madrid winning nothing this season and now trailing Barcelona by 11 points.
Vinicius Junior was Alonso’s biggest enemy within the dressing room. The Brazilian threw a very public tantrum when the coach took him off in the second half of the first ‘El Clasico’ of the season.
Alonso told allies at the time: ‘I didn’t realised I had come to coach a children’s nursery.’
Vinicius subsequently posted an apology in which he said sorry to everyone bar Alonso. Valverde, unhappy at being made to play at full-back, also feuded with Alonso.
Jude Bellingham, with a strong relationship with Vinicius forged in his first season at the club when he scored 19 LaLiga goals prior to the arrival of Mbappe, is closer to the Brazilian’s camp.
Tchouameni and Mbappe are very much on the other side of the dressing room divide backing Alonso and blaming the behaviour of Vinicius and Valverde for his sacking.
Real Madrid president Florentino Perez has seen the benefit of the chaos, with supporters now more open to the prospect of Mourinho returning to restore order
Alonso’s replacement, Arbeloa has not possessed the authority necessary to heal those dressing room divisions.
Picking Trent Alexander Arnold ahead of former Spain captain Dani Carvajal has also led to a major fall-out between Arbeloa and Carvajal.
Spanish media have claimed Carvajal is one of six players who no longer speak to Arbeloa, and the coach is teased with the nickname ‘cono’ (training cone).
The end of season meltdown at Madrid follows a second trophyless season that will be confirmed if Barcelona take a point against them today.
But club president Perez has seen a potential benefit to the chaos.
He has long wanted to rehire Mourinho but always stopped short of trying because of public opposition.
Opinion has now shifted with many supporters seeing Mourinho as the returning sheriff with the big personality to tame a wild-west dressing room that, with unprecedented breaches of discipline this week, has spiralled out of control.
