Jose Mourinho gives Champions League Clash update

Jose Mourinho will start Diego Costa up front tomorrow against a club he knows very well.

The manager was speaking at his pre-match media conference in the Portuguese capital of Lisbon, a city he worked in during his time with tomorrow’s opponents, Sporting Lisbon, and then Benfica. He provided an update on two of his strikers, starting with this season’s top scorer.

‘Diego starts,’ said Mourinho. ‘Hopefully he plays again on Sunday, against Arsenal, but at the moment I don’t think about Arsenal, I think about Sporting and Diego starts tomorrow.

‘There is a risk, yes, but he plays. We assume the risk and he plays. Hopefully everything goes well and hopefully from Tuesday to Sunday he has enough period of time to be back on track and play against Arsenal.

‘It’s an important game for us tomorrow, a difficult game. If I can play my best players and the team I think is the best team to try to get us a result, I’m not going to make any changes. That also gives me some players on the bench with the quality to help me, which can help me change the direction of the game. We are ready for another fight tomorrow.

‘Drogba is going to be out for a couple of weeks,’ continued Mourinho, with the subject now turning to the Ivorian striker who has not travelled to Lisbon with the squad.

‘He had a problem in the training session with his ankle, so it was not possible for him to travel and I think it will not be possible for him to recover for Sunday.’

A pair of 1-1 draws in the opening round of fixtures in Group G has left it evenly balanced, and Mourinho, asked if his team was the favourite to win tomorrow, acknowledged the difficulty of the match in the Jose Alvalade Stadium.

‘I don’t know the meaning of favourite in a football match. A good result is to win. We will try to win but to desire and to achieve are two different things.

‘Sporting has its weapons. A point could be considered a good result [for them]. Will the team mount its strategy based on the goal of achieving one point? On Friday we saw a team that is not going for a draw. If they stick to themselves and assume their identity then it will be a great match and a great return for Sporting to the Champions League.’

Mourinho has fond recollections of his time at Sporting in the nineties, when he assisted manager Bobby Robson. What feeling will Mourinho have when he returns to face a club where he spent important formative years in the world of coaching and management?

‘Pride, a sense of pride,’ he responded. ‘I was all I could be at this club. I tried to assist as much as I could at the beginning of my career. The only bad memory I had was when I left, but I have no grudges of course.

‘It’s been a long time since I faced a Portuguese team in the Champions League, since 2006/07. It’s a great joy to return.

‘If I could choose ultimately the outcome of this group I would place Chelsea at number one and Sporting at number two.’