"If you want me to rule out ever being Manchester United manager I can't."

Jose Mourinho's latest round of self-publicity will surprise few. Yet in stating his interest in succeeding Sir Alex Ferguson at Old Trafford he was doing more than to try and unsettle imminent opposition.

A sense of destiny is something that drives the self-styled "Special One" on. His mission was not quite accomplished at Chelsea where even his ego could not outdo that of Roman Abramovich, a man with the attention span and patience of a spoiled child with a playroom full of toys. Life at Internazionale is proving more difficult than he thought, despite a clear lead at the top of Serie A. After getting on so well with the press in the UK, where his preening, sly digs and jocular jibes made him manna to the average hack wanting to hit their word-count with a minimum of effort, Italy's media has not reacted too well to his brash brand of hectoring and wind-ups.

Saturday's statement was this: "In another 86 days I will leave Italy and go on holiday. Will I still be the coach of Inter? In football you never know." He clearly didn't enjoy his nine months out of the game and is getting his pitch in early if things go awry at Inter.

Should United do the unthinkable and win the lot, then perhaps, maybe, possibly, Fergie could decide he's had enough and done enough. Though this quote from the Scot suggests otherwise: "I am scared about thinking about retirement. I have been on the train for so long that when I get off it, I am scared my body will shut down."

Fast forward three years or so and go with the scenario that Mourinho does indeed get the job at Old Trafford. What are we to expect? One comparison is easy to draw, one which is receiving plenty of coverage of late. Brian Clough's 44 days at Leeds United are set to be documented in a major motion picture called "The Damned United", an adaptation of David Peace's wonderful ficto-realistic account of the departed self-confessed loudmouth's darkest and loneliest days in football.

Shortly before his death in 2004, Clough himself made the comparison after Mourinho had won the Champions League with FC Porto. "There's a bit of the young Clough about him," he said. "For a start, he's good-looking and, like me, he doesn't believe in the star system. He's consumed with team spirit and discipline. The players have to fit in with his vision and pattern of play, which is right." Were he around, then Clough might have some advice to give on taking over a dynasty. It might not go much further than a simple use of the word "don't".

Succeeding Don Revie proved to be bridge too far, not least because Clough had long been viscerally critical of "Dirty" Leeds and especially their boss in the years his Derby side had been competing with them for honours. What didn't help was the infamous opening team meeting that had Clough telling the players he inherited from "The Don" that "as far as I'm concerned you can throw all your medals in the bin because you got them from cheating."

Mourinho's relationship with Ferguson is more cordial. Both enjoyed winding up Arsene Wenger as his Arsenal team descended from the Mount Olympus of going a season unbeaten in the Premier League. The Portugese coach's touchline explosion as his team, rather fortuitously, knocked United out of the Champions League in 2004 and a post-match interview in early 2005 that saw Mourinho make a Benitez-style accusation of "Sir Alex was very clever, if you can say that, at half-time by putting some pressure on the ref," with the added barb of United being able to "cheat and cheat", seem to have been forgotten.

Rio Ferdinand recently opened the door on having Jose as his new boss, saying: "If you're talking about someone with the ego and personality to do it, then Jose Mourinho is the name that jumps out at you." In contrast, Sir Bobby Charlton, a man with the club etched into his heart and soul, said: "I would hate for anyone to take this the wrong way but I don't see him (Mourinho) here. He's got a talent but maybe if he ever came here the philosophy of youth football might never be the same again."

To play out the Clough-at-Leeds scenario, Rio seems to be taking on the Allan "Sniffer" Clarke role while Charlton appears to be adopting the attitude that Clough encountered in a hostile Elland Road boardroom. There's plenty of water to flow under the bridge until such a scenario could throw up the possibility of history repeating itself yet maybe Mourinho should heed the warning Clough's failure at Leeds before he starts day-dreaming of working from an office at Carrington. As Karl Marx said: "History repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce." Sounds like fun, then.

Clough's family have removed themselves from any association with either the film or novel of "The Damned United", unhappy as they are with its portrayal of a man wracked by demons and coming apart at the seams as he embraces failure for the first time in a long time. While fully understanding their reasons, yours truly will be catching it as soon as it is released to the general public. The question is, will Jose?