Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho survived a meeting with the Blues hierarchy on Saturday night, telling them he would only quit if it became apparent that he had lost the dressing room.
Mourinho said: “Go straight to the players. If they tell you they don’t trust me, that is the only thing that can make me resign. The only thing.”
Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich remained at the club till gone midnight following the Blues 3-1 loss at home to Southampton as the club looked into how they could turn around their dismal start to the season.
Abramovic is said to have been alarmed at the way the Chelsea supporters turned on Mourinho stunned after seeing the Portuguese manager bring on defensive midfielder Nemanja Matic, only to see him substituted 26 minutes later.
Following the loss Sky Sports pundit Jamie Redknapp claimed that the team were no longer listening to Mourinho, a comment that Match of the Day analyst Alan Shearer agreed.
Mourinho hit back: “People can say what they want.
“I think you should really ask the players and not go with ‘sources and fake sources and the players told a friend and the friend told the agent and the agent is not happy with me because I don’t play his player’.
“You should go straight to the players. Get a table at Cobham next week. John Terry is not going to the national team, Diego Costa doesn’t go, Ramires doesn’t go. Ask them.”
Redknapp had said: “Those players, if they’re behind Jose Mourinho they’re doing a bad job of showing it because there wasn’t a tackle made. They never got close to anybody, a really poor performance. You can blame it on lack of confidence but that to me is a very worrying sign.
“He seems like he’s losing his players, he’s got to bring them back somehow.’
Shearer added: “I think there are major problems in the Chelsea dressing room. All his rocks from last season are crumbling. All his players are under performing. The players are not responding to him.”
