Van Gaal: Pereira is better than Juan Mata as a number 10

From chanting his own name to calling a journalist fat, Louis van Gaal has an interesting relationship with the press.

“It is not the trainer-coach or the manager, but when he is playing like he has played now, he shall play at number 10”.

Mourinho has kept a low profile since being sacked by Chelsea in December with the Premier League champions struggling at the wrong end of the table.

Manchester United have held talks with former Chelsea boss Jose Mourinho with a view to him succeeding Louis van Gaal as the club’s manager at the end of the season, reported BBC. If I am not willing to do that, I don’t think I would have started here 1½ years ago.

In fact, after the defeat at Stoke, during Manchester United’s game at Old Trafford against Chelsea, unofficial scarves with Jose Mourinho’s face were sold outside the ground.

The Tottenham Hotspur manager has impressed the Old Trafford board members by getting Spurs to 3 in the Prmeier League table, where they are above Manchester United in 5, with one of the Glazer family being very keen on hiring the Argentinian.

But, despite being pleased with these results and hoping they promise more, Van Gaal is wary of saying all the problems are over and his players have finally grasped his style.

“We train still the same way”.

“I always say that I need competition and I need competition every week, and in Spain I was at an unbelievable club but I had four matches a year: Barcelona v Real Madrid, Real Madrid v Barcelona”.

Van Gaal said: “Now we have to win.

That is also the same for Jesse Lingard”.

“I played with Young at right full-back because he is an attacking full-back”. He has changed himself because at that time, he wasn’t good enough.

But after this week’s developments, which indicate that Mourinho is very much set to get his dream job, it looks as though LvG’s retirement from football management will begin a year earlier than he planned.

British outlet Independent, on the other hand are reporting that while talks are underway, the power brokers at United are said to favour Laurent Blanc and Mauricio Pochettino over Mourinho. The word is that they knew full well Pep Guardiola was never an option for Old Trafford, and therefore Mourinho is the single best-qualified available candidate for the job (and arguably the best-qualified of even the unavailable candidates).