SOCCER: When Jose Mourinho revealed yesterday that he chatted, laughed and sipped wine with Alex Ferguson in his office after Chelsea's League Cup semi-final against Manchester United on Wednesday it came as a surprise.

After all, only minutes before that jovial get-together the Chelsea manager had not only accused Ferguson of unfairly influencing the referee Neale Barry during half-time but suggested that United players had dived.

Mourinho is set to be fined, perhaps a record amount, for his subsequent and more strongly worded accusations that United "cheated", with the Football Association ready to press charges once he has responded to a request to explain his comments.

The former Porto coach insisted any punishment would be "unfair" but was yesterday at his most loquacious about Ferguson. Insistent that United's manager acted improperly, he said he told Ferguson as much to his face in his office when asked by his rival: "What did you say in the press, young man?" Mourinho stressed, though, that he holds the Scot in the highest regard, describing him as "a really nice person" and calling him "the boss" among his peers in this country.

"This is nothing against Sir Alex," he said. "After the game we were together in my office. We laughed, we spoke, we drank and, when we go to Manchester United (for the second leg), I will bring a very good bottle of wine because the wine we drank was very bad and he was complaining. Because it's my birthday when we go there I will go with a beautiful bottle of Portuguese wine to enjoy with him at the end of the game. He's a wonderful, great manager, he's clever and he used his power and his prestige and the referee shouldn't allow it."

Mourinho is adamant managers should never approach referees at half-time: "They shouldn't be under pressure." He believes Barry's handling of the game was affected by Ferguson but doubts he would have drawn such a response.

"I think we must be all the same," he said, "and I'm sure, because I'm a young guy and I have just arrived in England, that, if I shout to a referee in the tunnel, he would kick me out."

Ferguson, though, turned the tables on Mourinho and yesterday accused him of trying to influence Graham Poll, the referee for Chelsea's match at Tottenham today. The United manager feels Mourinho has orchestrated the controversy to leave Poll under pressure not to award important decisions against Chelsea.

"He is very clever," said Ferguson. "I had a drink with him after the game and he never said a word about it to me. But in the newspapers he has said, in his own words, that he tries to influence the referee in his press conferences before every match. So I don't think what he said had anything to do with Wednesday's game. It was all about their game against Tottenham. He's trying to influence the referee for that game."

Ferguson also seized on remarks by Chelsea's John Terry that Barry had not been "fair" or willing to listen to him. "I have to ask the question: why would he listen to him?" Ferguson said. "Is he saying other referees listen to him? I've never heard a captain say anything like that."

The FA will certainly ask Terry for an explanation of his remarks and is concerned about Mourinho's comment on Chelsea TV that, in the second half, "it was whistle and whistle, fault and fault, cheat and cheat". The FA believes Mourinho is guilty of a similar offence to that of Arsene Wenger with his "cheat" comments about United's Ruud van Nistelrooy that led to Arsenal's manager being fined £15,000, a record for an English manager. Mourinho is expected to get a comparable fine and perhaps a higher one.

Ferguson accepted he had complained to Barry at half-time about his failure to award United a penalty but revealed that Mourinho's assistant Steve Clarke and another member of Chelsea's backroom staff were also "getting into" the official.

If everything smacks of psychological warfare Mourinho insisted he was not interested in mind games with Ferguson. "He can play alone or with other managers," he said, "but not with me."