Jose: “To win these matches, the players need to wear the fans’ skin”

Jose Mourinho explained what it was like to land a victory in his first north London derby.

We came from behind to beat Arsenal 2-1 at the new stadium in the Premier League on Sunday as Heung-Min Son and Toby Alderweireld cancelled out Alexandre Lacazette’s opener.

We started well before Lacazette’s bolt out of the blue on 16 minutes. Sonny crucially levelled three minutes later, capitalising on Sead Kolasinac’s wayward pass to David Luiz and we took the spoils nine minutes from time when Toby rose to glance home Sonny’s corner.

“I’m very happy,” Jose told Spurs TV afterwards. “Of course, I was not born a Tottenham fan, but I was also not born an Inter fan, Real Madrid, Chelsea or United. I was born Vitória Setúbal, but I consider myself a big professional, and to be a big professional, you must love your club, you must love your fans.

“You must understand what they want, what they love and as I said to the players before the game, to win these matches, the players need to wear the fans’ skin. They must be ready to fight the same way the Tottenham fans would fight. They must be a fan playing football.

“The boys fought from minute one to the last minute. I can only be complimentary of them.”