Jose Mourinho clears up any confusion about Manchester United’s game against Liverpool
United skipper Wayne Rooney was dropped by Mourinho and the Portuguese Mourinho refused to confirm if the captain will return to the side against Fenerbahce in Thursday night’s Europa League group game at Old Trafford. “I’ll be ready when needed”.
Referee Anthony Taylor played a central role in a niggly half, somehow holding off from brandishing a yellow card until the 43rd minute after a series of fouls from both teams.
“I cannot confirm that he will play, but now he is fit and it is now time for him to go back to the levels that we know he can achieve”. “I’m 31 next week, I’ve got a lot of football left”.
Mourinho was cautious against certain opponents with his Chelsea and Inter Milan teams, but they always looked like they could nick a goal on the counter-attack or from a set-piece.
In his pre-match news conference, Mourinho said Altrincham-based Taylor would struggle to have “a very good performance” at the centre of United and Liverpool’s fierce rivalry due to him hailing from the north west of England.
“Jurgen Klopp has clearly made his decision on who is going to be Liverpool goalkeeper for the foreseeable future”, wrote Aldridge, in his Liverpool Echo column.
Now at the Blues’ Premier League rivals United, Mourinho has been tasked with the aim of trying to steer the Red Devils back into the top four while challenging for the major domestic trophies – similar to Conte. Today Liverpool two shots? However, as United proved on Monday night and Burnley earlier in the season, if you are well organised defensively and disrupt their link up play, there is no plan B.
“If there’s one thing Monday’s Anfield stalemate demonstrated, it’s that Manchester United acknowledge they are behind Liverpool at present”.
“We have to play with a good team knowing that two days later we have to play in the Premier League”.
“I think it was a good performance, hard match for us and for them and I think we controlled the game tactically and we controlled the game emotionally, and it’s not easy to do both things in here”.
Matip nearly created a winning goal for his side in the second half too as he moved forward and slid a pass into Emre Can, whose strike was stopped by David de Gea.
The Merseyside outfit’s point leaves them two points adrift of Premier League leaders Manchester City and second-placed Arsenal after eight games. “But the next game, I will do better”, Ibrahimovic told reporters. “We will have to do that better in the next game, but we will learn”.
“We didn’t keep the ball all too well”.