Jose Mourinho has claimed that having Arsenal’s assistant manager Albert Stuivenberg working with Gareth Bale over the coming fortnight with Wales makes him “uncomfortable”. The Dutchman is Mikel Arteta’s assistant at the Gunners and is also serves the same role for Ryan Giggs with the Welsh national team. With Giggs not involved with Wales over this international break after being arrested on suspicion of assaulting his girlfriend and released on bail pending further enquiries. In his absence, Robert Page will take charge of the side for their three matches in the coming fortnight with Stuivenberg, who worked at Manchester United before Mourinho’s time at Old Trafford, assisting him.
Jose Mourinho said “He’s getting better and better and [against Ludogorets] I felt he could play 90 minutes, but it’s not about can or cannot, it’s about managing the situation and keeping him safe, That’s because he’s a player that needs to be safe, he’s a player that had enough problems in the past. He’s working so much and we’re all working so carefully with him that we don’t want to destroy the work everybody is doing for the last couple of months. Wales has two matches where they play for the Nations League and I expect him to play, but if they care as much about him as we do, they have to manage the recovery period. They have to manage how many days’ difference between one match and another. They have to manage the minutes that he plays and they should not let him get to fatigue levels. It’s not Giggs responsible for these matches and I’m sorry about it, because for the previous fixtures he called me, we spoke about Ben Davies – not Gareth because Gareth was not there – and we shared opinions on the situation, which is probably not going to happen this time. The fact that one of the coaches is an Arsenal coach does not make me very comfortable. Honestly, it doesn’t make me very comfortable. National team matches should have coaches that work exclusively for them, not coaches who work for other clubs.”
