English FA Premiership: Jose Mourinho has launched a stinging attack on Arsene Wenger, calling the Arsenal manager "a voyeur" and mocking his Premiership rival's poor start to the season by saying the Frenchman should speak less about Chelsea and concentrate on improving his own team's results.

Mourinho was clearly irritated by comments Wenger made on Friday when questioned about Chelsea's draw at Everton and Carling Cup defeat at home to Charlton. He has responded with his most fierce criticism to date of Wenger and claimed the Arsenal manager has shown he is worried about Chelsea.

Wenger was widely reported on Saturday to have said Chelsea will have lost "the big belief" because of those setbacks, though he actually said "a little bit of the belief has gone". He also claimed it brought "a little hope" for those trying to catch the champions and disputed Mourinho's remark that Chelsea had not lost against Charlton because they went out in a penalty shoot-out. "When you are out of the cup you lose," he said.

Mourinho responded in characteristically outspoken fashion after seeing Chelsea reassert their authority with a 4-2 win at home to Blackburn Rovers on Saturday. "I think he is one of these people who is a voyeur," he said. "He likes to watch other people. There are some guys who, when they are at home, they have a big telescope to see what happens in other families."

Wenger is consistently asked about Mourinho's team at his pre-match briefings and invariably offers an opinion. He has said several times that Chelsea are more vulnerable than their early-season results might suggest and refused to rule his team out of the title race despite trailing their London rivals by 14 points.

"It bothers me because the guy is speaking all the time," Mourinho said. "We never speak about them. You can do it when you are the top and you have a big morale. When you are on game number 11 and you still can't win away from home, and when you are without Thierry Henry and he can't win a game, he should be worried about them. He's worried about us, he's always talking about us. It's Chelsea, Chelsea, Chelsea, Chelsea.

"I might be worried if my team made a defensive mistake. I shouldn't be worried about what Arsenal did at Tottenham. They are always speaking about the other families. These are our secrets.

"You have to speak about opponents and other things and put some pressure on and pass the message, but when you are doing it every time in the same direction . . . They need to work and try to improve. I don't know if he wants my job, I don't know. He loves Chelsea."

Mourinho has at times shied away from criticising Wenger. He was asked before the season whether Arsenal had made a mistake in selling their captain Patrick Vieira to Juventus and responded that Wenger was a top manager who must have a plan.

Of more practical concern to Mourinho will be the fitness of his Argentinian striker Hernan Crespo, who has not travelled to Seville to face Real Betis tomorrow in the Champions League after picking up a muscle injury on Saturday.

Guardian Service