If Jose Mourinho tries to rekindle his Chelsea love affair it will all end in tears

The swagger from Setubal will rightly always be revered at Stamford Bridge for galvanising an expensively assembled squad and injecting a winning mentality that propelled them from nearly men to champions.

That awesome mental strength was a hallmark of the Blues under Mourinho and the apparent evaporation of such a quality in recent weeks has led many to question Carlo Ancelotti's position and some to hark back fondly to the days of Portuguese past.

After all, who better to restore the bravado than a man so impressed by himself that he hangs mirrors instead of wallpaper in his house? (Probably.)

"I love Chelsea," said Mourinho this week. "I was the happiest man [when there]. I was thinking to be there all my life and a few months later, I was out. So you never know."

Mourinho's apparent overtures will have done little to lighten the mood of Ancelotti, whose position remains preposterously precarious given he won the Double with an ageing side just nine months ago.

But Mourinho's motivation for such a statement surely stems from his on-going power struggle at Real Madrid rather than a genuine longing for a return to west London.

Mourinho has battled with club president Florentino Perez and right-hand man Jorge Valdano over player selection - Mourinho asked for a striker in the summer but was refused and only secured Emmanuel Adebayor on loan from Manchester City as a late and last resort - as the two camps disagree over potential targets and transfer policy.

Sound familiar? After all, it was Mourinho's relationship with Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich that prompted the Special One's departure in September 2007, with the concession of the Premier League title earlier that year to Manchester United and a somewhat indifferent start to the following campaign as mere footnotes.

The £50million purchase of Fernando Torres and particularly the period in which Ancelotti appeared to know little about the deal's progression will have shown Mourinho that nothing has changed. He was presented with Andriy Shevchenko and Michael Ballack and his failure to successfully integrate them contributed to losing his job.

Mourinho will, in all likelihood, return to England once his Madrid mission ends but he craves the autonomy Sir Alex Ferguson enjoys at United and the financial freedom at Manchester City - both appear likelier destinations should Ferguson finally step down.

But despite Mourinho's undeniable talents - those of us whose enthusiasm is tempered by his breathtaking arrogance cannot deny his impressive record - he is a manager who has thrived principally in taking a team whose building blocks are already in place and adding the finishing touches and a strong team spirit.

This is not to belittle Mourinho's achievements but Chelsea, however much some are in denial, are a team in transition requiring considerable rebuilding over the next few years. Such reconstruction is not his strength, Mourinho is all about the here and now. He is the Olympics, someone else can worry about the legacy.

At Porto, several of the key components of his 2004 Champions League-winning side were already at the club when he arrived two years earlier.

Vitor Baia, Ricardo Carvalho and Deco were pivotal to their success and Mourinho supplemented them with players such as Nuno Valente and Paulo Ferreira.

His impact was significant but change rather than an overhaul was required. Similarly, at Chelsea, Mourinho inherited a side largely assimilated by Claudio Ranieri and his own transfer record at Stamford Bridge was somewhat questionable.

For the successes of Didier Drogba, Michael Essien, Ashley Cole and Carvalho, there was also Mateja Kezman, Asier Del Horno, Tiago, Jiri Jarosik, Steve Sidwell, Shaun Wright-Phillips and Khalid Boulahrouz.

Young players were not developed but established stars were reinvigorated and enhanced.

Mourinho rebuilt to an extent at Inter Milan with the excellent acquisitions of Wesley Sneijder and Samuel Eto'o while Hernan Crespo, Adriano and Luis Figo left or retired.

But at the San Siro he was dismissing relics of previous generation whereas at Chelsea, over the coming years he would have to phase out players he made great including Drogba, Frank Lampard and John Terry. Mourinho is among the very best managers in the world and his period at Chelsea allied a newly-formed superpower with the brightest emerging talent in the game to create the perfect storm.

Those conditions have changed both at Chelsea and with Mourinho, whose reputation is taking something of a knock in Spain as Real languish five points behind Barcelona and feels he must have greater authority in his bid to beat the Catalan giants.

Speculation over Ancelotti's future continues to gather momentum but talk of his successor is premature and it would be reasonable to afford him time to address the issues at hand.

There is no doubt Mourinho continues to look back on his past at Stamford Bridge with great fondness and a second spell at the club could happen in the distant future. But not now.

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