Mourinho leaves Fenerbahce after Champions League failure in latest career blow to the 'special one'

Jose Mourinho’s fall from grace in elite soccer accelerated Friday when the charismatic Portuguese coach left Turkish club Fenerbahce, two days after failing to get back into the Champions League after a long absence.

His latest short managerial spell — this one lasted barely a year, in a second-tier European league — leaves the 62-year-old Mourinho’s career at a crossroads, with top teams potentially no longer wanting to take a chance on a coach whose best days might be behind him.

Fenerbahce’s elimination at the hands of Benfica in a Champions League qualifying playoff on Wednesday was another blow to the status of Mourinho, who once was considered one of the world’s best coaches and famously had a heated rivalry with Pep Guardiola during their time in Spain with Real Madrid and Barcelona, respectively.

A Champions League winner with Porto and Inter Milan, Mourinho has not coached in the main stage of the marquee competition for six seasons. He won the third-tier Conference League with Roma in 2022 but his time at the Italian club from 2021-24 was pock-marked with squabbles that resurfaced in his brief and chaotic spell in Turkey.

There was an incident in April when he grabbed the nose of Galatasaray coach Okan Buruk in the Istanbul derby, earning a three-match ban and a fine.

Indeed, the fiery matches between the two local rivals brought out the worst in Mourinho. Two months earlier, he was handed a four-match ban after making an incendiary comment in the aftermath of a league match against Galatasaray, which announced its intention to start legal proceedings against Mourinho.

Mourinho, who often railed against what he perceived to be poor refereeing in Turkey, wore the look of a frustrated and unhappy man during his time with Fenerbahce.

Gone was the charm and self-confidence that oozed out of the self-styled “Special One” during the peak years at his first spell at Chelsea from 2004-07, for example.

In October, he even said: “I think the best thing I have to do is when I leave Fenerbahce I go to a club that doesn’t play UEFA competitions. So you find a club in England from the bottom of the table, needs a coach in two years, I am ready to go.”

Who knows, that might be where Mourinho ends up after his departure from Fenerbahce, whose own absence from the Champions League now stretches to 17 seasons.

“We have parted ways with Jose Mourinho,” Fenerbahce posted to its millions of followers in a short statement on its X and Instagram accounts. “We thank him for his efforts for our team and wish him success in his future career.”

There was no immediate statement on the club’s official website.

Mourinho was once a serial trophy winner, a guarantee of silverware.

Yet that’s now two clubs — Tottenham (from 2019-21) and Fenerbahce — where he hasn’t guided his team to a title. His career trajectory, meanwhile, is heading downwards: from Real Madrid, to Manchester United, to Tottenham, to Roma and then to Fenerbahce.

Coaching the national team of his native Portugal might be one future option for Mourinho, who established a strong reputation for being a pragmatic, tactically astute manager with an uncanny ability to win one-off matches. Those attributes might serve him well in international soccer.

The days of him leading teams to success in the Champions League or in the top European leagues seem a long way away, however.

It hasn't been a good couple of days for former Man United managers in Turkey.

On Thursday, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, who replaced Mourinho in charge of United in 2018, was fired by Besiktas hours after a loss to Swiss team Lausanne in the Conference League playoffs.

Solskjaer had been in charge since January.

AP soccer: https://apnews.com/hub/soccer

FILE - Fenerbahce's head coach Jose Mourinho looks on prior to the Europa League round of 16 first leg soccer match between Fenerbahce and Rangers at Sukru Saracoglu stadium in Istanbul, Turkey, Thursday, March 6, 2025. (AP Photo/Khalil Hamra , File)

DENVER (AP) — A Frontier Airlines plane hit and killed a pedestrian on the runway of the Denver International Airport during takeoff, airport authorities said, sparking an engine fire and forcing passengers to evacuate.

The plane, on route from Denver to Los Angeles International Airport, “reported striking a pedestrian during takeoff at DEN at approximately 11:19 p.m. on Friday," the airport's official X account wrote.

A spokesperson for the airport said the pedestrian, who jumped a perimeter fence, has died. They said the unidentified person was hit two minutes after entering the airport. The person is not believed to be an airport employee.

“We're stopping on the runway,” the pilot tells the control tower according to the site ATC.com. “We just hit somebody. We have an engine fire.”

The pilot tells the air traffic controller they have “231 souls” on board and that an “individual was walking across the runway.”

The air traffic controller responds that they are “rolling the trucks now" before the pilot tells the tower they “have smoke in the aircraft. We are going to evacuate on the runway.”

Frontier Airlines said in a statement flight 4345 was the one involved in the collision and that “smoke was reported in the cabin and the pilots aborted takeoff.” It was not clear whether the smoke was linked to the crash with the pedestrian.

“The Airbus A321 was carrying 224 passengers and seven crew members,” the airline said. “We are investigating this incident and gathering more information in coordination with the airport and other safety authorities.”

Passengers were then evacuated via slides and the emergency crew bused them to the terminal. The airport spokesperson said 12 passengers suffered minor injuries and five were taken to local hospitals.

Denver Airport said the National Transportation Safety Board had been notified and that runway 17L, where the incident took place, will remain closed while an investigation is conducted. It is expected to open later today.

The pedestrian death came a day after a Delta Air Lines employee was killed while on the job at the Orlando International Airport. In a statement, the airline said the employee was killed Thursday night without providing details of the incident nor the name of the employee.

“We are focused on extending our full support to family and taking care of our Orlando team during this difficult time,” the airline said. "We are working with local authorities as a full investigation gets underway to determine what occurred.”

FILE - A Frontier Airlines jetliner taxis down a runway for take off from Denver International airport on Nov. 25, 2025, in Denver. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski, File)