Mourinho moved to Chelsea in June 2004, becoming one of the highest paid managers in
football with a salary of £4.2 million a year, subsequently raised in 2005 to £5.2 million. In a
press conference upon joining the English side, Mourinho said, "Please don't call me
arrogant, but I'm European champion and I think I'm a special one", which resulted in the
media dubbing him "The Special One".
Mourinho recruited his backroom staff from Porto, consisting of assistant manager Baltemar
Brito, fitness coach Rui Faria, chief scout Andre Villas Boas and goalkeeping coach Silvino
Louro. He retained the services of Steve Clarke, a long-serving former player at Chelsea, who
Es in had also performed an assistant managerial-type role under previous managers at the
club. In terms of spending, Mourinho carried on where his predecessor Claudio Ranieri left
off and made some of the best transfers in English League like: Tiago Mendes (£10million)
from Benfica, Didier Drogba (£24million) from Olympique Marseille, Mateja Kezman (£5.4
million) from PSV Eindhoven and FC Porto pair Ricardo Carvalho (£19.8million) and Paulo
Ferreira (£13.3million).
Under Mourinho, Chelsea built on the potential developed in the previous season. By early
December, they were at the top of the Premier League table and had reached the knock-out
stages of the Champions League. He scooped his first trophy, winning the League Cup, after
beating Liverpool 3-2 (AET) in Cardiff. Towards the end of the match, Mourinho was escorted
from the touchline for allegedly inciting Liverpool fans following Chelsea's equaliser.