CALCULATOR DOES NOT LIE: Mourinho insists with the money Wenger has spent, Gunners are ‘ready’ to rival Chelsea for EPL title

After all these years, Arsene Wenger is still the one who gets Jose Mourinho animated the most of all.

These two coaches have barely had a kind word to say about each other since Mourinho first arrived on these shores back in 2004.

Wenger’s desire to portray Arsenal’s business model as more virtuous and frugal compared to that of Chelsea’s, has often got under the skin of the Portuguese.

As far as the latter is concerned, Arsenal and Wenger have no excuses for their 11-year wait without a League title and should no longer be playing the role of under-dogs.

In what should make the Community Shield between the two clubs on Sunday an even more lively affair, Mourinho said: “This is the easiest thing to do – I don’t do it. Get a calculator,” before making the noise of a cash till to emphasise his point.

“Every club is different, we don’t need to speak about them but if you add up the amounts clubs have spent in the last three or four years I think maybe you will find a surprise.

FANTASTIC GOALKEEPER

“If you put Mesut Ozil plus Alexis Sanchez, plus Callum Chambers, plus Mathieu Debuchy (total cost £100.5m) you will maybe find a surprise.

“They have just bought a fantastic goalkeeper (Petr Cech from Chelsea for £10m) and that is a position which is very important in a team.

“It’s a fantastic squad with good players, a fantastic goalkeeper, they are more than ready to be a title contenders.”
It should be pointed out that Mourinho wasn’t on the offensive throughout the 35 minutes that had been allocated.

He spoke of his plans to possibly play with two strikers more regularly next season, providing hope for Radamel Falcao no doubt that he will get a chance to share the limelight with Diego Costa.

The former Porto coach also hopes his team can mount a serious challenge for the Champions League over the next four years.

However, Mourinho won’t be upset if history repeats itself and another manager takes over and wins it with a team he’s built, as he feels Roberto di Matteo achieved in 2012.

LOW EBB

Still there was one last subject dear to his heart. Last term he was so driven to distraction by the performance of match officials, he even moaned there was a campaign against his side.

The standard of refereeing did hit a particularly low ebb in the top flight during the year and Mourinho feels there should be consequences for the man in the middle if he fails to perform.

“Mistakes are a part of the game but a lot of mistakes are not,” he said.

“I’m emotional and this game doesn’t allow us to make lots of mistakes because we are punished for that “Many of the guys, I like their approach to the game, they want to be positive and want to have a good relationship with the players.

—Agencies