Play (T2P), a company that provided equipment, training DVDs and tactical software for football clubs. One of their innovations, an application called the Mourinho Tactical Board, was custom-made for the man it was named after. United by mutual admiration, Campos and Mourinho had become close allies.

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Campos also earned the trust of super-agent Jorge Mendes, and the scouting work he undertook for Porto further enhanced his reputation as one of the sharpest minds in the Portuguese game.

After seven years without an official position in football, Campos made a triumphant return in July 2012 when Mourinho invited him to join his backroom staff at Real Madrid. It was the ultimate riposte to his detractors.

"It was not by chance, because I have blue eyes or because I'm beautiful," Campostold Portuguese newspaper O Jogo in 2016. "I was invited because Jose Mourinho understood that I had the competence to work with him."

Anyone walking past Campos' office on the ground floor of Madrid's Valdebebas training centre could have been forgiven for thinking it looked more like it belonged to a Silicon Valley tech guru than one of the world's leading football scouts.

There were no piles of notepads, no bulging files, no overflowing drawers. Instead, all of Campos' data was meticulously collated on his laptop and iPad. He kept his office clean and tidy. There were photos of his wife and two daughters, as well as a picture of Campos astride a mountain bike in a nod to one of his hobbies.

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One of Campos' recommendations arrived at