Former Chelsea boss Ruud Gullit criticizes Mourinho for snubbing Mata

Ruud Gullitt during his time as manager of Chelsea

Former Chelsea boss Ruud Gullitt has criticized current manager Jose Mourinho for leaving Juan Mata out of the starting line-up. Sky Sports reports.

The 25-year-old didn’t even make the bench for the 2-0 win over Fulham as the Brazilian Oscar who later justified his selection with a goal was preferred in the play-making role by Mourinho .

Guillit served as manager of The Blues for two years from 1996-1998 soon after calling time on his career at Chelsea. The Dutchman feels that Mourinho should use all the creative players available instead of re-building the team.

“He was one of the best players last year, therefore it’s something personal,” Gullit toldSaturday Night Football.

“I live in Holland and we watch a lot of games in the Premier League and we’ve seen a lot of Chelsea games.

“The criticism that most people have in Holland is that with the team and all the names they have, they haven’t played good football. They have played very defensively.

“We saw it in the first match. The first half against Hull was unbelievable and the second half was terrible. You win 2-0, but it’s not what you expected from a team with these sorts of names.

“Then we saw them against Bayern Munich and it was defence almost all the game. It’s not something we expect from Chelsea, not from this team.

“I think they can play much better football than they’ve shown. It’s sometimes too tactical. With the players he has you don’t need to be like that. You can be a little bit more adventurous.

“He took that out by not playing Mata. Oscar is a great player, I agree with that, but I’m afraid everything becomes too tactical.”

Oscar continued his good form for Chelsea netting the opening goal and going on to bag Sky Sport’s Man of the Match prize.

Guillit,51, heaped praise on Oscar for his performance but fails to understand why Mata isn’t being featured along with him in the midfield.

He added: “It was not a question of Oscar or Mata. We love Mata as well and Mourinho is right to have so much confidence in Oscar.

“In the first half there was no spark at all from Chelsea and his goal helped them to get into the game.”

Mourinho has confirmed that Mata will feature in the Capital One Cup clash versus Swindon on Tuesday.