José Mourinho will be “burning up inside” as he watches Chelsea’s season unravel, according to the footballer who became his staunchest defender at Real Madrid. Álvaro Arbeloa has admitted that Mourinho does not react well to failure, describing him as a victim of great expectations – both his own and others’ – but the former Liverpool full-back is adamant that there can be “no doubts” about Mourinho and that he would welcome him back at the Santiago Bernabéu, insisting: “He could retire today and he would [still] go down as one of the best coaches in history.”

Chelsea face Liverpool this weekend sitting 15th in the league, 11 points behind the leaders, Manchester City. They have won just five times in all competitions and are third in their Champions League group. It is the worst start in Mourinho’s career, yet those who watched his final campaign at Madrid might think that history is repeating itself. Arbeloa says that Mourinho suffered that year, to the extent that he wondered if he had slept, and admits that there were tensions between the manager and his squad, but blames the players themselves.

Mourinho angrily rejected suggestions that he suffers from “third season syndrome”, suggesting that journalists “click Google” before asking “stupid questions.” He may have had a point insofar as there was no third season at Porto or Internazionale and although he did not win the league or the Champions League in the third season of his original spell at Chelsea, he did win the two Cup competitions. But things had started to come undone at Stamford Bridge too and the parallels between this, the third season of his second spell at Chelsea, and his third season in Madrid are striking.

2012-13 ended with Madrid empty-handed, after they quickly found themselves adrift following a poor start. Unable to react, things just got worse. Increasingly tense, Mourinho was sent off in the Copa del Rey final, confronted the media, and refused to appear in press conferences, and there was also a collapse in his relationship with key players, some of whom he criticised in public – among them Cristiano Ronaldo and the club captains Iker Casillas and Sergio Ramos. In his behaviour, and in results, the similarities are inescapable.

Mourinho left having won one league title and one Copa del Rey in three years, while Barcelona collected two league titles, the European Cup and the Copa del Rey. But Arbeloa insists that Mourinho’s time at Madrid cannot be considered a failure and says that the same success and drive that makes defeat so hard for him to take will ensure that Mourinho recovers.

“Mourinho’s problem is that he has got us spoilt. In almost every year, every club he has managed has won things,” Arbeloa says. “He is very demanding and he is used to winning. There are other coaches who can go two or three years without winning anything; he is not used to that. Losing really burns him up inside, not giving everything and not winning trophies. It is something that he cannot control. But that [same] concentration of energy is what brings him back to win things again.”

Arbeloa suggests Mourinho came to feel let down by some of his players during his final season in Madrid, echoing what appears to be happening in London now.

“Perhaps footballers are not used to having 100% demanded of us at all times, but we should be,” Arbeloa says. “If us players burn out in the third season I don’t think it’s Mourinho’s problem, it’s probably ours.

“[In the third season] things didn’t go smoothly right from the start. We lost points very quickly. To see how hard it had been to get the better of Barcelona and win La Liga [the previous season] and to then give it away so quickly, José didn’t take it at all well. He demanded more from us all the time and when there are a lot of demands and when in the end there is friction it wears down the dressing room a bit.”

It wore Mourinho down too. “I spoke with him a lot and José is a coach who demands a lot and he doesn’t know any other way than to be that demanding. He would say: ‘I’m not able to say: “How’s it going?”, “How do you feel?” to a player who isn’t trying.’ To a player who is trying and giving everything he is able to say that. But if he has a player who isn’t trying then he isn’t capable of putting an arm around the shoulder.

“I remember a lot in that season seeing him with rings under his eyes and thinking: ‘This guy is not sleeping, he is not relaxing.’ He can’t deal with the situation, [with] the [fact that] team is not functioning; that he has such a good team with such good players but it’s not working as he wants [when it] worked properly just a few months earlier. He didn’t take that at all well.

“When it was clear that he was going I was pretty sure he wanted to go back to London: he had always felt loved at Chelsea, he knew they would respect him there and let him work. And the balance up until now has been good. It’s true that things are not going well this season and we are all surprised because we expected to see Chelsea even stronger than last year.

“Everyone is more susceptible [to reacting badly] when things are not going well. He has won so much in such a short time and it is not easy for him if he is not winning as much this season as last. He has a strong character. He gets sent off when things are going well so of course it can happen too when things are not going so well.”

Arbeloa rejects suggestions that clubs may be reluctant to recruit the Portuguese coach in the future. “You can’t have any doubts about him. Mourinho is a bit like Real Madrid – he always comes back. He still guarantees success. Every club where he has been has won things. Mourinho was capable of bringing [Barcelona] down from the mountain. He doesn’t get enough credit for that.”

All of which means Arbeloa believes that Mourinho could even be a candidate to return to the Bernabéu one day. “I’ve been asked before and I always say ‘Yes, why not?’” he says. “He was a very important coach here. It is clear that because of the way he is, because he is very direct and he tells people straight, without hypocrisy, he upsets a lot of people. There are a lot of people waiting [for him to fail] but there are a lot more waiting to see him turn things around and move forward again. He’s a very good coach so I don’t think the door at Real Madrid is shut to him, no.”