Manchester City midfielder Frank Lampard says first playing for Jose Mourinho was his happiest time in the game.

Lampard felt Chelsea transformed English football during that time.

"The first Mourinho era was my happiest time in the game," Lampard told the Mail on Sunday. "It was a two or three-year period of success. We were all young, it was new to us, we felt a bit invincible, like winners do.

"I had never touched that. I'd just seen other teams do that. I had seen Roy Keane lift the League trophy most years and all of a sudden I was an integral part of a really good team.

"We were changing the face of English football via the personality of Mourinho himself. The biggest thing Jose brought me, more than anything tactical, was self-confidence. His own self-confidence rubbed off on me. The way we played, we had determination and flair and I loved it. It was a period of my life when I didn't even have to think about playing.

"I trained and played. It wasn't a problem for me to play every week. As a team we felt we'd win every week. We were flying, I was at a great club, living in London and happy with my football. It was all that I ever wanted."