Jose Mourinho’s rocky return at Benfica – and that special moment

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Moments can change things. Games, seasons, careers.

Jose Mourinho needed a moment. He needed something close to a miracle to save his first season back at Benfica, where he had first managed at senior level 26 years ago, and that was before their final league-phase match in the Champions League, at home against Real Madrid, had even begun on Wednesday evening.

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Out of both Portuguese cups and a distant third in the Primeira Liga, 10 points behind leaders Porto, the unlikely chance of making it to the Champions League’s play-off round next month was their only hope of salvaging something tangible from the campaign.

But they began the night two points and five places outside the top 24 in the 36-team table, meaning they had to beat Madrid and hope a whole bunch of results elsewhere went their way.

Remarkably, almost all of those results did go their way. But it wasn’t quite enough. As the clock advanced deeper into stoppage time, suddenly, arms started waving everywhere. Benfica were 3-2 up, but their coaching staff had only just realised they needed one more goal to squeak above Marseille, and into the play-offs in 24th place. The Lisbon crowd had realised a few minutes earlier. The 17 other games across Europe had all ended, so they were trying to pass on the message, but it hadn’t yet reached the home dugout.

Mourinho had already made all of his substitutions, including taking off his entire front four, trying to see out a win. When he was finally told the truth, he was livid. Moments earlier, his goalkeeper Anatoliy Trubin had been actively wasting time. When his coaches and team-mates on the bench then started screaming at him to hurry up, he looked baffled.

Then Benfica won a free kick in Madrid territory, and Mourinho waved Trubin upfield, hoping for a miracle…

Things haven’t quite gone to plan since Mourinho was appointed for his second spell as Benfica manager, back in September.

But what happened on an otherwise normal early Saturday morning at the club’s training ground, to the south of Lisbon city centre, wasn’t really about him.

Around 200 of the club’s fans, mostly members of