Mourinho at Porto vs Amorim at Sporting: How do they compare?

For one week in 2018, Jose Mourinho had a second shadow.

Hovering behind every move made by the then-Manchester United manager was a freshly retired Portuguese midfielder studying for his coaching badges by the name of Ruben Amorim. The relationship between these compatriots has come full circle following Amorim’s appointment as United’s latest head coach.

Much like Mourinho, who established himself as Europe’s most promising young manager thanks to a trophy-laden spell at Porto in the early 2000s, Amorim wooed United with a staggering array of accolades at Sporting CP.

Mourinho left Portugal for Chelsea in the Premier League, swiftly ending the club’s long wait for a Premier League title as the first managerial appointment of the club’s new ownership. As Amorim attempts to replicate the same feat for INEOS at United, here’s how his Sporting compares to Mourinho’s Porto.

“There are lots of poets in football,” Mourinho once said, “but poets don’t win titles.” Amorim – who was dubbed “the poet” by Cristiano Ronaldo during their shared time in the Portuguese national team – would disagree.

The latest Portuguese coaching phenom has led Sporting to a pair of top-flight crowns during his four full seasons in Lisbon. Before overseeing last term’s title, Amorim steered Sporting to the 2020/21 trophy, ending the club’s 19-year wait for national glory. Incidentally, Sporting’s previous triumph (2001/02) came during Mourinho’s first campaign at the helm of Porto.

Two decades ago, the Portuguese giants were forced to turn to a 39-year-old former translator who had overseen just 34 professional matches after slumping to fifth place at the halfway stage of the season. Mourinho managed to salvage a top-three finish but that still represented the club’s lowest league position in 20 years. They would win the league title in each of his two full seasons.

Amorim’s Sporting boast remarkably similar statistics to Mourinho’s great side, even if they were pipped to the title in 2022 and 2023. Between Amorim’s arrival in Lisbon and his appointment at United, Sporting’s 77% win rate represented the highest of any team in any of Europe’s top ten leagues.

“We can do some nice things,” Mourinho said ahead of Porto’s first season in the Champions League. “But I don’t think we can win it. Only the sharks who can afford to spend £40m on one player can do that.”

That financial disparity has only widened over the subsequent two decades, which helps explain why Amorim’s Sporting never made it beyond the quarter-finals of a UEFA competition during his tenure. That’s not to say that they haven’t claimed some notable scalps, memorably beating Tottenham Hotspur and Arsenal, but Amorim cannot come close to Mourinho’s European pedigree.

Leading Porto to the 2003 UEFA Cup was impressive enough – even if the final triumph over Celtic was a gruelling affair – but that lofty crown pales in comparison to the unthinkable achievement of Champions League glory one year later.

Ditching his 4-3-3 for a more compact 4-3-1-2 for the continental clashes, Mourinho’s side lost just one game en route to the last Champions League title for a club outside Europe’s top five leagues. That sole reverse came away to Real Madrid‘s Galacticos in a group-stage campaign which concluded with a draw at home to the Spanish giants.

Porto then knocked Manchester United out of the last 16. After a 2-1 win in Portugal, Mourinho’s side snatched victory in the tie with Costinha’s 90th-minute strike at Old Trafford, which the enthusiastic young coach infamously celebrated by tearing down the touchline. Lyon, Deportivo La Coruna and finally Monaco would topple as Mourinho outwitted Europe’s sharks.

Before embarking upon his coaching career, Amorim told Tribuna Expresso in November 2017: “I like [Pep] Guardiola, but for me, the role model is Mr Mourinho.”

While Mourinho ultimately evolved into the anti-Guardiola, conceding possession and mastering the art of defending deep before striking on the counter, he had not gone through his deliberately villainous arc when taking over Porto.

Upon his appointment in 2002, Mourinho declared: “I promise that I intend to play on the attack.” The youthful coach, yet to be scarred by Barcelona‘s decision to hire Guardiola instead of him in 2008, added that this style would “never include a defensive way of playing”.

Amorim is far more pragmatic than the young Mourinho. Entirely willing for his side to huddle in a compact 5-4-1 block off the ball, Sporting conceded the fewest shots of any team in last season’s Portuguese top flight. Amorim’s brilliantly drilled outfit can spring forward in transition or dominate possession. Mourinho, by comparison, was a huge advocate of keeping the ball at Porto.

The former Barcelona assistant coach spoke about “resting with the ball” and deliberating keeping “possession for possession’s sake” during his time in Portugal. This represents a dramatic shift in philosophy compared to his time at Real Madrid, when one of Mourinho’s rules read: “Whoever has the ball has fear.”

This obsession with possession represented a way for Mourinho’s sides to get their breath back after haring around the final third in an aggressive press. This is a trait shared by Amorim’s sides, but looking beyond the specific details, his wider approach to match preparation is clearly taken straight out of the Mourinho playbook.

As Amorim has explained in the past, he admires how Mourinho “analyses the opponents very well and sets his team up, not just with a certain style of play but thinking a lot about how to adapt to win”. That is another habit the pair share: winning.

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