Jose Mourinho has broken his silence in the wake of his sacking as Manchester United manager last month by launching what appears to be a thinly veiled attack on the club's management structure, Paul Pogba and player power.
Mourinho also seemed to have Mauricio Pochettino and Jurgen Klopp in his sights as he sought to defend his brand of football by taking a swipe at a younger generation of coaches who are lauded for their style of play, despite a lack of trophies.
Mourinho - who has ruled out retirement by insisting that he "belongs to top-level football" - is gagged from talking directly about United because of a confidentiality clause in his £15m (R266m) severance package.
But, in his role as an Asian Cup pundit for beIN Sports, the Al Jazeera spin-off, Mourinho appeared to leave little to the imagination as he spoke for the first time since his dismissal a week before Christmas when the club was 11 points adrift of the top four in the English Premier League following a 3-1 defeat by Liverpool.
The final, tumultuous months of his reign were marked by disagreements with the board over signings and fall-outs with players, notably Pogba.
Mourinho's relationship with Pogba hit a nadir when he branded the club's £89m record signing "a virus" during a dressing- room tirade after a 2-2 draw at Southampton last month.
And, in what looked like a dig at Pogba, he appeared to insinuate that player power was out of control at United by suggesting the days of a player not being allowed to think he was bigger than the club were gone.
"I think it was when Manchester United sold David Beckham to Real Madrid, if I'm not wrong, but the phrase I kept with me from the biggest one in the Premier League - Sir Alex Ferguson - was: 'the day a player is more important than the club, goodbye'," Mourinho said.
"Not any more. Not any more. Because there are many things behind [the scenes] now that means it is difficult to create a situation as linear as this one.
"The manager is there to coach them [players], the manager is not there to keep the discipline at any cost. The structure must be made. The structure must be there to protect the manager and for the players to feel that everything is in place and they are not going to arrive into a situation where they feel more powerful than they used to be."
Mourinho appeared to suggest that United's structure behind the scenes was inadequate and responsible for undermining the manager and failing to help bring players into line. His remarks could also be perceived as criticism of executive vice-chairman Ed Woodward, with whom Mourinho clashed over transfers after the failure to sign a centre-half in the off season last year.
Woodward's background is in business and Mourinho seemed to insinuate that United suffered from the absence of a director of football, even though the club is thought to have encountered some resistance from its former manager over plans to recruit one.
"If I tell you that I consider one of the best jobs of my career was to finish second with Manchester United in the Premier League, you say, 'This is crazy'. He won 25 titles and he's saying second position was one of his best achievements, but I keep saying this because people don't know what is going on behind the scenes."
As well as being criticised for poor results and his management, Mourinho came under attack for his dour football.
But he defended himself by insisting it was coaches like him, Pep Guardiola and Carlo Ancelotti who had achieved success over a sustained period that would be remembered over young managers who were praised for their style of play but had little silverware to show for it...