So Jose Mourinho's back. I've got a plan for him to prove to any doubters that he is a quality coach, and not just a manager who spends loads of money.
My plan helps England as well. So let's see what Jose is really made of after his pain in Spain. He's got something to prove after Real Madrid couldn't wait to get rid of him.
I'm not thrilled about his return – Chelsea have the kind of talent in their squad that warrants a focus on football rather than the ego-driven, attention-seeking press conferences of the Precious One.
The Real Madrid reality check will hopefully have brought Mourinho back down to earth. He must now realise that despite achieving a lot in his managerial career, he isn't as special as he thought he was.
He has left Spain with nobody from the two giants there ever wanting him to return. His reputation isn't exactly destroyed but it has taken a severe beating. Had he gone to Madrid and won La Liga title after title, and Champions League trophies, his greatness would not be in question.
He now needs to do something a little bit different to prove he belongs on the same level as some true greats.
But at Chelsea he has already won the Premier League title. Then someone else won the title with the Blues. And someone else came to the Bridge and won the Champions League. So simply winning trophies won't elevate Mourinho to greatness.
In fact, with Manchester City and United both changing managers and appointing replacements with no record whatsoever of winning titles, it would be failure for Mourinho to do anything other than win the Premier League comfortably next season.
I can only think of one thing that will make me start believing Mourinho is a coach. I mean a proper coach, not just a man who splashes fortunes and makes friends with players.
Since taking Porto to Champions League glory Mourinho has walked into clubs with money to spend and good players already there.
Now is the time for Jose Mourinho to do something different and Chelsea is the perfect club for it. He can also do England a favour at the same time.
Chelsea have been to three of the last four FA Youth Cup finals, winning two of them. Plenty of English players have been involved in that success so I'm setting Mourinho the task of working with, developing and coaching at least one English youngster into the Chelsea first team, and then making him ready for the England team.
He has two midfielders at Chelsea who both won the Youth Cup, who both won the Under 17 European Championship final with England in 2010, beating Spain 2-1 in the final, who both are currently with the England Under 21s at the European Championship, and who both have just had a season in the Championship playing first-team football.
I will be impressed with one, but surely turning both into top class internationals isn't beyond Mourinho, if he is as good as his admirers think he is.
In Josh McEachran he has the perfect opportunity: he was the standout player for Chelsea in their 2010 Youth Cup win over Aston Villa, two years ago he was Chelsea's young player of the year, and he has already played Premier League and Champions League football.
Three months ago in an interview with Sportsmail, McEachran hinted that the frequent change of managers at Stamford Bridge – Mourinho is the fifth since McEachran made his Chelsea debut less than three years ago under Carlo Ancelotti – hasn't helped him.
McEachran said: 'There were a lot of things happening at Chelsea with managers and when you are a young player you need to get the trust of the manager for him to play you, so it was hard.
'Playing week in, week out for Middlesbrough has really helped me. The Championship is a tough division and it has helped me grow up and become a better player.'
I was at the Riverside in April to watch Middlesbrough draw 0-0 with Peterborough. It was an awful game but McEachran stood out: in the first 90 seconds he played three passes that nobody else on the field could have seen.
He played a brilliant ball during the first half that created the best chance of the game, wasted by Boro's useless strikers. I came away wondering why on earth a player of his quality was playing with footballers not even close to being on his wavelength.
But Premier League managers seem reluctant to give the youngsters who come through their academies first-team football. In fact, not one of that England Under 17 side who won the Euros in 2010 are first-team regulars in the Premier League.
I refuse to believe none of them are good enough. Managers are either under too much pressure, or too lazy.
Mourinho has time on his hands in his new position. He is unlikely to be sacked in a hurry by an owner who by giving him the job has backtracked on his decision to part company with him in the
first place.
first place.
So instead of spending money on ready-made players, let's see Mourinho do some coaching. Let's see him do something he rarely does – seriously improve an individual player (Raphael Varane at Real Madrid is the only one I can think of and even he cost Mourinho £8.5million as an 18-year-old).
And wouldn't it be good if Chelsea actually produced a regular first-team player from their academy for a change.
Mourinho has the perfect opportunity to do something positive for Chelsea, for England and for his own reputation. Let's see what he's really made of.
Gerrard shows top players don't care about England
Stuart Pearce's complaint about the eligible Under 21 players missing from the European Championship because they're with the senior side was a valid one, but missed the point.
It would have been brilliant to see Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, Phil Jones and Jack Rodwell bust a gut to get to Israel, like some of the Norwegians did. But ultimately Pearce's issue loses weight when he throws Steven Caulker up front with strikers sitting on the bench.
And Pearce has previous – keepers Joe Lewis and David James have both played up front under him in the past. That kind of thinking will understandably win him no friends.
The real issue is with senior players not being committed to England, and the knock-on effect of that is younger players being called up by Roy Hodgson. I want to highlight one of my favourite players, Steven Gerrard. For me, the England captain has let his country down.
Gerrard and Liverpool knew about his shoulder injury for 'several months' before the decision was taken to operate on it with two games to go.
Why wait? Liverpool were not involved in any cups, and not challenging for the top four. When Gerrard played in the Merseyside derby, he aggravated the shoulder in a clash early on with Leon Osman, yet he stayed on the pitch for 90 minutes, Liverpool using only two of their three substitutes.
The operation was timed by Liverpool to enable Gerrard to come back for pre-season training. I'm sorry but Gerrard has got his priorities wrong here. All the decisions about Gerrard's shoulder operation were made for Liverpool's benefit.
Gerrard needed to intervene and make his own decisions. If he still puts an also-ran Liverpool outfit under an experiment of a manager ahead of England then he shouldn't be captain of his country. Once you wear that England armband, everything changes. I hope Gerrard realises that.
I know he was desperate for the England captaincy, so at this stage of his career he needs to put international football first. He should have shown the rest of the England players the way by saying to Liverpool that he would be going to Brazil for the friendly, and having the operation when he returned. And if he missed the first chunk of pre-season with Liverpool then so be it.
In Gerrard's mind he should be targeting this World Cup. And that means leading England to Rio de Janeiro for the friendly, then having the operation, and then being fresh and fit for the back-to-back qualifiers in September against Moldova at Wembley, and then against Ukraine.
Gerrard will know England's qualification is in the balance – so he should be showing his commitment. England's best players need to play together more, even in friendlies, because at times they look like strangers in crucial qualifiers.
As captain Gerrard led England to painful defeats against Russia and Croatia that meant we failed to qualify for Euro 2008. I hope he has learned his lesson from those painful times.
Liverpool fans will be raging at this I'm sure. But Gerrard has dragged an often below average side to great heights in his time at Anfield, now it's time for him to reward the England fans.
He's done all he can for Liverpool; they won't be winning the Premier League title he craves, so England must come first ahead of next year's World Cup. That's what I expect from a man given the honour and privilege of captaining his country.
Don't lazily think this is some sort of criticism of Gerrard as a player, regular talkSPORT listeners will know how highly I rate him. Gerrard was my pick for the talkSPORT Book of Premier League Legends as well.
In the book I wrote: 'He's English, he's influential, he's iconic, he's a leader and a brilliant footballer. Not many in the list have all those qualities. He's a consistently brilliant performer and arguably the greatest player ever to play for one of England's biggest clubs.'
The obvious cry from those who dismiss this is that Liverpool pay his wages. Now is the time for the FA to take radical steps. England fans are all sick of clubs having so much control and making the England manager's job difficult. So the FA need to take a leaf out of cricket's book and start issuing central contracts.
The FA need to pay a chunk of the wages of up to 25 or 30 England players, in exchange for a guaranteed influence on the decision-making process around that player. So if the FA offered to pay some of Jack Wilshere's wages for example, they would have had he right to say to Arsenal that he shouldn't be on the bench at the end of the season for use in emergencies, he should have had his operation as early as possible to get him fit for the new season.
When the England captain chooses pre-season friendlies for Liverpool ahead of a trip to the Maracana and next year's World Cup hosts with his country, it is clear the Football Association cannot carry on like this. Central contracts for England players is the way forward.
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