De Bruyne revealed how Mourinho triggered his Chelsea departure:
"There was so much in the press about my relationship with Jose Mourinho. But the truth is that I only ever spoke to him twice. The plan was always for me to go on loan for a bit."
"Jose called me into his office in December, and it was probably the second big life-changing moment for me. He had some papers in front of him, and he said, 'One assist. Zero goals. Ten recoveries'. It took me a minute to understand what he was doing."
Then he started reading the stats of the other attacking forwards - Willian, Oscar, Mata, Schurrle. And it's like - 5 goals, 10 assists, whatever. Jose was just kind of waiting for me to say something, and finally I saidBut some of these guys have played 15, 20 games. I've only played three. So it's going to be different, no?' It was so strange. I was completely honest. I said, 'I feel like the club doesn't really want me here. I want to play football. I'd rather you sell me."
TheChelseaFC