Football: Man City like to take dive says Mourinho

Jose Mourinho, left, and Pep Guardiola have lit the fuse for an explosive derby with the united coach in a typically antagonistic mood. Photo / Photosport

Ahead of the Manchester derby Jose Mourinho lit the red-and-blue touchpaper and stepped back.

After a declaration that such seismic encounters were a "beautiful thing" it turned ugly with Mourinho effectively accusing Manchester City of being a team of divers — "a little bit of wind and they fall," he said dismissively — while their manager, Pep Guardiola, is someone who has received preferential treatment from the authorities with their allowance of him wearing a yellow ribbon in support of jailed Catalan pro-independence politicians. Let battle commence.

For the avoidance of any doubt this was Mourinho's response to a straightforward question as to what had impressed him about the Premier League leaders, City, so far this campaign. "Impressive? They are a good team," he said. When prompted to be more specific, Mourinho added: "Many things. They defend well, they react well to the moment they lose the ball.

"They have good dynamics in attack, they have creative movement, they have amazing players. They have a fantastic coach. They have lots of good things. If you ask me one thing that I don't like a lot it's that they lose their balance very easily."

Nobody had had the opportunity to ask him what he did not like — and probably would not have done so anyway — but when asked to expand, for the sake of clarity, Mourinho said: "A little bit of wind and they fall."

It was classic Mourinho. Perhaps he was using the pre-match tools available to him to sow seeds of doubt in the minds of the officials, led by referee Michael Oliver. But maybe he was also suggesting City's eight-point advantage over United was not simply a product of fair play and good football — even though United's captain, Antonio Valencia, is the only player on either side to have been booked for diving this season. Mourinho wanted to stoke the fires a little; to tweak the nose of his biggest rival.

It was a variation, also, on what the United manager had said after his side's impressive 3-1 victory at Arsenal last Saturday when he claimed "there is a desire to go for the grass" with Arsene Wenger's side. For Wenger, when Mourinho first arrived in England, read Guardiola today. Not just in the perceived purer, more attractive style of football, but in the fact that here is the man who Mourinho identified as his biggest threat and, as Guardiola put it, a "twin" when it comes to an obsessive desire to win and win trophies.

When the smoke blows away the fixture will kick-off at 4.30pm at Old Trafford, forecast snow permitting, and is a genuine, bona fide Super Sunday: United v City; second v first; Mourinho v Guardiola.

This is the one, just as The Stones Roses' song is played at United's Theatre of Dreams. And this really is the one for The Special One because, although it may still be two weeks to Christmas, if City win their 14th Premier League game in a row — a record — and extend their lead to 11 points, then this title race would feel over.

There will be 22 league matches to go after this one, and therefore 66 points to be played for, but a swing of four games, 12 points, is formidable.

If United do not claim the title it would also mean Mourinho's record of always winning the league in his second season at a club is ended.

So it feels big; very big. And given Guardiola's obsessive ambition, the resources available to him, and the sense that his young team — packed with talent such as Kevin de Bruyne, Gabriel Jesus, Leroy Sane and Raheem Sterling — can only get better by winning something, then the Premier League, the whole of Europe, may also be secretly rooting for Mourinho which, at the very least, will allow him an ironic chuckle.

With such fixtures, Mourinho can be deadpan. He knows the stakes. He has been here before — whether it is refusing to be the "clowns" in Liverpool's "circus" when his Chelsea side won at Anfield to end a brewing title party in April 2014, or citing his 25 trophies (including two Community Shields) and stating that there are "lots of poets in football, but poets don't win titles".

To some, though, Guardiola is the poet laureate and also has the titles (just four fewer than Mourinho who is eight years his senior).

Mourinho has been deliberately provocative on this occasion and, interestingly, there was no imploring of the United fans to get behind his team as he attempted earlier in the campaign.

"I stopped with that," he said. "I'm not going to write any more words about it. I'm not going to say any more words about it.

"We are paid to work and work hard and to give the best we can and not to criticise the fans and I not going to say any more."

United are without Paul Pogba, which may adjust their approach, while Mourinho has to navigate a line between stopping City and doing enough not to be accused of betraying United's DNA, something at which he bridles.

Winning matters rather than the manner of the win. Not just for United but for this title race.