​José Mourinho has officially begun his second tenure as Real Madrid manager, with Mundo Deportivo reporting that the Portuguese boss opened the club’s pre-season at Valdebebas on Monday morning, July 13, 2026. He commenced with medical examinations at the Clínica Sanitas facility before stepping onto the training ground for his first session at 17:00. The kickoff practice is intentionally pared back, designed to ease players back into action after a long off-season. Several high-profile World Cup participants—Jude Bellingham, Kylian Mbappé, Vinícius Júnior, and Thibaut Courtois among them—are not present and are set to return in a staggered fashion as the squad rebuilds for the new campaign. Those in attendance at the first session include Eduardo Camavinga, Franco Mastantuono, Trent Alexander-Arnold, and Dean Huijsen, who will be the first to operate directly under Mourinho’s guidance.
To fill out squad numbers for the training phase, Mourinho will call on players from Real Madrid Castilla, highlighting an adaptive approach to squad management during a pre-season already complicated by the congested World Cup calendar. This underscored beginning serves as a reminder that Mourinho’s full assessment of his squad will take weeks to form as the group gathers together and the training workload intensifies.
Mundo Deportivo notes that Mourinho’s appointment follows a period of instability at Real Madrid: Xabi Alonso’s project lasted roughly one year, and Álvaro Arbeloa, who had stepped up from the academy ranks to stabilize the team, managed less than six months before departing. The objective for the new era is unmistakable: deliver consistency and tangible results from a squad that possesses abundant individual quality but has not consistently translated that talent into silverware.
Mourinho has been actively shaping the project since his confirmation was made public after Florentino Pérez secured re-election as club president. Monday’s sessions mark the tangible shift from theoretical plans to practical action. Pre-season reporting has already signposted early recruitment activity and shifts within the coaching staff, according to Football España, suggesting the direction in which Real Madrid is heading as the new regime begins to take shape.
A formal press presentation for Mourinho has not yet been scheduled, per Mundo Deportivo, with no date confirmed at the time of writing. Transfer activity remains an open question: sources indicate that both incoming and outgoing moves at the club are possible, though the core structure of the squad is broadly settled. The more telling judgments on this new era will come once the international players return to full fitness and the competitive calendar resumes, when Mourinho’s true blueprint for Real Madrid will begin to come into sharper focus.