First stint at Chelsea:
Drogba
Carvalho
Robben
Cech
Essein
^ All examples of players that were vital to Chelsea's success.
Inter:
Milito
Sneijder
Eto'o
Lucio
^ All examples of gems vital to Inter's success
Real Madrid *
Luka Modric
Di Maria
Varane
^ examples of Real Madrid gems. Although Real's strategy is more Perez pressing buttons than anything else.
Chelsea second stint:
Costa
Fabregas
Matic
Pedro
Wilian
^ examples vital to his initial success for Chelsea.
I get there is a lot to beat Jose with. We can talk about the great talent he's misjudged and sold too. But lets not pretend he hasn't got acquired great players over his career. Weirdly that stopped with us. It was underwhelming under LVG too. Go figure?
Cech and Robben were already signed for Chelsea.
Etoo had nothing to do with him. Milito was a former top scorer.
Varane had nothing to do with Mourinho. Modric won flop of the year when Mourinho was actually at Madrid.
Pedro wasn’t very good.
Mourinho at one point had made about six years worth of signings who had been voted the countries worst signing.
Queresma, Crespo, Schevchenko, Veron, Bailly, Fred, Cuardardo, Bhoularouz, Sanchez, Modric (again voted worst signing under Jose), Rhamen, Jarosic, Mikhitaryan.
In the list of his best ever signings you have players like Robben and Cech who were already signed. Former top scorers in the leagues and players like Etoo and Fabregas who needed no scouting whatsoever.
His whole career he has basically lived off being the manager who spends the most in the league. He gets the most out of a squad in the second season and then leaves when it all comes crashing down. His best players have all been players he inherited, signings has never and will never be a strength of his. You can tell that because he leaves squad in a worst state than when he starts.