Ballack tells Mourinho: 'You're history now'

Michael Ballack last night warned Jose Mourinho his Champions League mind games will count for nothing as he told the Chelsea boss: “You’re only history.”

Mourinho’s first return to Stamford Bridge since leaving Chelsea in September 2007 is guaranteed to leave the Blues fans with mixed emotions.

And amid fears from some Chelsea supporters that the “Special One“ is ready to wreak revenge on Roman Abramovich and bitter rival Carlo Ancelotti, Ballack insisted the Mourinho factor will count for nothing.

The German midfielder said: “It’s no secret that we worked with him for a long time, most of the players.

“But it’s gone now, he’s gone now, and we have to keep going.

“We have had a few other coaches since then.

“Of course it is a special moment that we play against him. But also we play against a team of good players and we have to be focused on that.”

Ballack’s relationship with Mourinho was at times strained and while the Portuguese always backed him publicly - in contrast to Andriy Shevchenko, who also arrived in 2006 - his entourage was not so complimentary, especially when the German ignored club advice and missed the 2007 title run-in to undergo career-saving surgery.

The midfielder, however, accepted that Mourinho is the man everybody wants to see.

He added: “It’s normal that when a guy like him comes back that the papers write about him and there will be a few comments.

“He will have a great response from the fans here too.

“But I think we will put this to the side. We know what we have to do on the pitch.

“Once we come to the game, I will try to put the Mourionho stuff out of my mind, to focused on myself and focused on the team. It is really not a big theme in the dressing room, you know.”

Chelsea know that have to win the game - by two clear goals in Inter score - to go through after the 2-1 defeat in the San Siro and although the Blues felt they should have won that first leg Ballack warned: “We have to put this out of our mind and forget it completely.

“We know the result and now it’s a completely new situation, a new game. We have to be 100 per cent focused to make sure we are in the next round. We saw this in the first game, we had a lot of possession, we played a good ball but in the end we lost.”

Ballack’s determined mood will have been improved by the news that Mourinho lost his rag with his squad after Friday’s defeat at Catania and that his fellow countryman, German referee Wolfgang Stark, is in charge of tomorrow’s game.

Mourinho locked his players in the dressing room for a foul-tempered tirade in which he accused them of becoming a “laughing stock“ and suggested they were set to be remembered for throwing away the Serie A crown.

The shock tactics saw Mourinho condemning the players individually and as a unit and the Portuguese will be more concerned by the appointment of the German whistler.

Stark was accused by Barcelona of favouring the Blues in last season’s semi-final first leg, especially when he chose not to show Ballack a second yellow card for a blatant foul on Andres Iniesta.

More crucially, perhaps, Inter have never won in four games overseen by Stark, including the 2-0 second leg defeat at Old Trafford last season, the 5-1 home reverse against Arsenal in 2003 and the  infamous brawl-ridden exit at Valencia in 2006-07.