Updated October 21, 2018 13:16:37

Manchester United manager Jose Mourinho has accepted an apology from Chelsea's coaching staff after being involved in an ugly scuffle during their Premier League match at Stamford Bridge.

Mourinho's side had been poised to earn a comeback win at unbeaten Chelsea until a stoppage-time equaliser from substitute Ross Barkley earned the Blues a 2-2 draw and sparked a pitchside pantomime.

The Portuguese was enraged by the provocative celebrations of Marco Ianni, one of Chelsea manager Maurizio Sarri's assistants, after the 96th-minute goal and had to be restrained as he tried to pursue Ianni down the tunnel.

The charmless episode left Sarri accepting that the Chelsea bench was in the wrong and ordering his assistant to apologise to Mourinho.

Photo: Jose Mourinho is restrained by stewards during the melee on the sideline. (Reuters: Dylan Martinez)

Mourinho, who guided Chelsea to three Premier League titles, was prepared to move on from the incident, although he was keen to absolve himself of any blame.

"I am not annoyed with anything," he told Sky Sports.

"What happened was with Sarri's assistant, Sarri was the first one to come to me and say he will resolve it.

"The assistant has already come to me and apologised, I told him to forget it.

"I have made a lot of mistakes in my career. He was very impolite but Sarri took care of the situation."

Photo: Jose Mourinho speaks with Chelsea manager Maurizio Sarri after the match. (Reuters: Andrew Couldridge)

Sarri said he would take action with Ianni behind closed doors.

"I didn't see what happened but I have spoken to Jose Mourinho. I understood that we were in the wrong side of the situation," he told the BBC.

"I have spoken to a member of my staff and have dealt with this immediately.

"If I speak to a member of staff and am very hard [with him] I cannot come here and tell everything because then I am not credible with the staff."

While Mourinho accepted the apology, the insult for him was certainly not as bad as missing out on all three points that his under-pressure side would have deserved.

He called it an "awful" result after one of United's better performances of a chequered season and when Manchester City later destroyed Burnley with four second-half goals, it meant Mourinho's troops, now ninth, are nine points behind their neighbours.

Reuters/ABC

Topics: sport, soccer, english-premier, united-kingdom, england

First posted October 21, 2018 13:10:05