Mourinho: Doing everything to qualify

Jose Mourinho may have plenty of Champions League pedigree but he insists his desire to keep on winning matches for his club is of much greater significance than any further personal glory.
Our European campaign gets underway tomorrow when we host Schalke at the Bridge. At his customary pre-match press conference at Cobham this afternoon Mourinho, twice a winner of the Champions League, was asked whether his team could improve on last season’s run to the semi-final stage of the competition.
‘In this moment I only think about not playing in the Europa League,’ he responded. ‘I want my club to succeed in the group phase. It would be very bad for the level of the group to go to the Europa League.
‘Do I want to win it again? Of course I want to. The tournament is part of my history and, even if they don’t sometimes know it, I am a part of the tournament’s history.
‘But my motivation is always the same. What drives me is to try to win. I work for my club, for my players and for my supporters, not for myself.

‘The competition or the opponent doesn’t matter, we want to win every match. Obviously we can’t do that but our approach doesn’t change, whether it’s the Premier League, the Champions League or the Capital One Cup.
‘In the Champions League we have a championship of six matches and three opponents, and we have to do everything to qualify.’
With four wins out of four domestically, the season has got off to an excellent start. Mourinho believes his squad has improved from the one which finished third and reached the Champions League semi-finals in 2013/14, but he was keen to stress there is still plenty more to come.
‘We are far from perfection. We try to improve every day. We did that today. There are always new aspects coming into our game.
‘There was an evolution from this year to last year. The team has better conditions to play better football, even though we did well last season. It’s difficult to do better but we feel we have the conditions to try to do so with a better team and a better group.’
Mourinho, who stated during the conference that he has no injury concerns, also gave his assessment on tomorrow’s opponents Schalke, who have picked up one point from their opening three Bundesliga games.
‘Obviously they lost their last match 4-1 but I don’t see that as a drama or having a consequence in the Champions League,’ said Mourinho. ‘They have only played three games and they drew against Bayern Munich.
‘I don’t see any relation because of the fact they lost the last match. Probably it will make them stronger. Probably they can discuss the mistakes they made; they can try to have a different approach to be a better team and a difficult opponent.’
Media reports this morning have suggested that Eden Hazard, last season’s Player of the Year, is soon to be offered a new Chelsea contract. Mourinho concluded the conference at Cobham by giving an update on the Belgian winger’s future.
‘He’s obviously a player we want to keep. In spite of the fact he already has a long-term contract, because he is as young as he is it’s true that Chelsea are trying to have an agreement with him over a new contract.
‘It’s also true because Eden made public, even before the World Cup, that he wants to stay and he wants to be here for more years. It will be a question of time but it will end with a new contract.
‘He means a lot to us because he’s a fantastic player. Every day we are feeling his motivation to work hard and improve.
‘His talent allows him to think about going from a top player to one of the great players of his generation. We are very proud he thinks Chelsea is the perfect environment to have that evolution. That’s why he wants to commit to us, and why we want to commit to him for the future.’