John Terry offers bizarre explanation for Jose Mourinho’s snubbing of Kevin De Bruyne and Mohamed Salah at Chelsea

The Portuguese manager marked his return to the Premier League this week by succeeding Mauricio Pochettino as Tottenham boss, 11 months on from being sacked by Manchester United.

Mourinho has previously been called into question for his inability to get the best out of De Bruyne and Salah at Stamford Bridge, two players who have since gone on to become stars at Manchester City and Liverpool respectively.

The two players made just 16 league appearances between them for the Blues but Terry, who was also a member of the squad at the time, believes Mourinho had every right go about things the way he did.

However, the current Aston Villa assistant strangely pointed to the form of Damien Duff and Arjen Robben as part of a justification for Mourinho’s selection – despite the pair having departed Chelsea years before the arrival of De Bruyne and Salah.

“In my generation now I see people like Salah and Kevin De Bruyne come through and not being able to match his standards at the time,” Terry told Dubai Eye radio.

"Now they were very talented but very young individuals as well. But Mourinho didn't have time to put them in the team or take out a Duff or Robben because we were winning every single week and his job is on the line.

"So, like I said before, if you come in and you are 10 or 20 per cent below the standard of Duff and Robben who were scoring 20 goals a season each. You are not going to make that team, no chance.

"Fair play to them they've gone away elsewhere and proved they're good enough but at that present time they weren’t good enough for Chelsea."

Now read...

QUIZ Can you name the 40 most successful Premier League managers by win percentage?

ANALYSIS Why Trent Alexander-Arnold means so much to Liverpool fans