Jose Mourinho has piled the pressure on Arsene Wenger, saying he would have found a solution to the Frenchman’s dreadful run against him by now.
The Arsenal manager has not beaten Mourinho in 13 attempts, a record Wenger will be hoping to put right at Wembley tomorrow.
And the Chelsea manager insists if he was on the wrong end of such a sequence, he would have found answers.
‘If you were on the other end of it? I think I would ask myself why,’ said Mourinho.
‘I would try to answer it, but not because of a mental block, because I would want to try to find solutions to help my team to do it.
‘Try to find a different way, try to find the reasons why it goes all the time against my team.
‘Have I ever been on a run like that? No. I think I lost twice against Tony Pulis, I lost against Crystal Palace and against West Bromwich Albion. One game each.’
Mourinho’s comments will add spice to the enduring feud between the two managers ahead of the Community Shield.
The former Real Madrid boss has famously branded Frenchman Wenger a ‘voyeur’ and a ‘specialist in failure’ in recent years.
He made a further jibe earlier this week by claiming the Gunners had bought their way into the title race with the big-money acquisitions of Mesut Ozil, Alexis Sanchez and Petr Cech.
Nevertheless, Wenger insists his awful record against Mourinho is not keeping him up at night.
‘It doesn’t bother me at all,’ insisted Wenger.
‘It’s a game that is important, but it is still preparation.
‘We want to win it and overall it can just give us that little bit more confidence before we go into the season.
‘Reading significance into every game is part of football now. We have to accept that every game is decided and judged as definite. But you know that in real life it is not like that.
‘The tribunal is out there and will draw conclusions from Sunday. But no matter, positive or negative, we have to continue our way and focus on ourselves.’
Meanwhile, Mourinho has provided an insight into how he maintains a winning mentality at Stamford Bridge.
The Portuguese coach will be hoping for more trophies after winning the Premier League and Capital One Cup last season.
‘In competitive situations in training, if one team is winning by three goals difference, I finish the training,’ said Mourinho.
‘It means that the ones that are losing are not training well.
‘So if you don’t train well, you don’t train. But the players love to win, so I think they accept it well.
‘How many times have I done that? Once in Canada (during pre-season).’ – Daily Mail