Jose Mourinho will begin his new season as Real Madrid coach on August 22, first facing Deportivo de La Coruna and then Schalke in preparation matches. Ahead of his return, he has recalled his tense relationship with former goalkeeper and captain Iker Casillas during his first spell in charge, in a new Netflix documentary.
Three conversations with Casillas
Mourinho said that in each of his first three conversations with Casillas as captain, the goalkeeper raised a demand unrelated to football. According to Mourinho, the first time, Casillas came to ask for more vacation time for players called up to Spain's national team.
The second time, Mourinho said, Casillas asked him to delay training sessions by an hour, citing heavy traffic in Madrid at the time Mourinho wanted to train. The third time, Casillas went further and proposed doing away with pre-match concentrations, telling Mourinho the players did not want to stay at the hotel and preferred to meet on match day and go straight to the stadium. Mourinho said he quickly concluded the squad had been indulged.
Documentary features Casillas
Netflix released the three-episode documentary series about Mourinho on August 11, with Casillas among those interviewed, just as the coach returns to the Real Madrid bench. Casillas described his relationship with Mourinho at the time as very cold, according to the documentary.
It is not the first time Casillas has hinted at irony over Mourinho's return. In April 2026, as rumors of the comeback intensified, he posted three popcorn emojis on X. He had also revealed in the Movistar documentary "Colgar las Alas" that in August 2011 he and his teammates decided not to play as a form of protest, after which things were said that neither of them took well.
New rules at Valdebebas
Mourinho has already made clear there will be no room this time for negotiating schedules or old habits. Players must report to the club's Valdebebas training complex one hour before each session begins.
Injury recovery has also been centralized there, in the morning and afternoon, with no outside treatments or visits to specialists outside the club. Nutrition is no longer a personal choice either: the club nutritionist now sets fixed breakfast and afternoon snack menus for the squad.
One measure Mourinho introduced from the start says much about the kind of environment he wants to build: all players and coaching staff must stay together to eat at Valdebebas after every training session. To carry out that model of discipline and cohesion, Mourinho is relying on figures such as Sami Khedira, one of his most trusted men on the new coaching staff, where control of the locker room is non-negotiable.
