Mourinho's press conference for Southampton

Mourinho makes a lot of sense to me when you listen to his interviews in full.

In my opinion he is shielding a lot of problems at United he is seeing that he cannot talk about.

He also seems like he's lost his desire, the desire he had at Porto (that run at Old Trafford), Chelsea, Inter (that famous scene at Nou Camp), and even at Real in wanting to beat Barcelona.

I don't see the same Mourinho as that anymore. I see a defeated guy for some reason.

Doesn't make one tiny sense when one team has just 48 hours between two games and others like Arsenal and chelsea get more days off.

He's right about transfers. That's the way it is for now.

There have been chances to rest Lukaku. For a while we were trying to play him through his dry spell. Rashford and especially Martial have been very capable of playing through the middle all season long.

Must be a first.

It's the Christmas schedule in the EPL. You have to learn to live with it. It's not some great conspiracy it's just the way it is.

The eyes often see what they want to see. Why would Mourinho be a defeated guy after winning 2 trophies last season and currently sitting second in the league?

Some of the narratives that fans try to paint border on the ridiculous.

There's a few more quotes in the Guardian's article having a dig at Klopp's comment from last year regarding market prices. In a way, Jose was asked, and so responded; he wasn't shit-stirring for the sake of it.

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2017/dec/29/jose-mourinho-jurgen-klopp-van-dijk

Maybe then it should be equal for every team. Why have uneven gaps? Again its not us but also Liverpool who suffer because of this and also other midtable and lower level teams. Should be consistent is all my point.

watching MUTV waiting for the presser. Listening to the fans singing Championie

TV scheduling. Some teams were live Wednesday and last night while we weren't. TV gives us the money to go for players like Pogba so no matter how much we don't like it it's a necessary evil.

Good on Jose for calling out Klopp on his hypocrisy.

Unable to give Lukaku a rest. My gosh; it really is not that hard at all.

So Rom is fatigued, Zlatan is not ready (and may not be). I wonder if he's more keen on bringing in a new striker now, or if this is mitigated with a right winger, creating some selection for the attacking third.

We could line up with Martial up top, Rashford wide left, Jesse behind and then Mata wide right, drifting in. But there are currently no other options, unless we play Mkhi which doesn't seem very plausible.

What's the status of Martial?

I agree with him that Lukaku needs a break. The man looks out on his feet and it's effecting his performances.

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A whole lot of trasnfer talk from Mourinho.

http://www.manutd.com/en/News-And-F...lans-for-2018-discussed-by-jose-mourinho.aspx

Jose is getting very frustrated.
He isn't being backed in the transfer market, meanwhile Pep has been given a blank cheque book to sign whoever he feels is required to win.
I do home Jose can put pressure on the club, so that they allow him to spend.

Here is the presser:

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I wonder if Mourinho knows that he could just rest Lukaku and try Martial or Rashford there? Really don't see why he's so scared to do it.

I think he did clear that by saying club backs him.

That's your interpretation?
Look the tweet below.
He isn't being backed, based on what?

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Love it. José pushing the narrative quite a bit to make United a big team and not just a big named club. Been cheaping out on not giving up an extra £10M-£15M or so to get the elite player they are after and settle for a much less quality player for a still expensive price which is just a waste of money considering how much extra United have to pay being the club they are.

Go big or go home. It’s time we bite the bullet and pay up if we want to be as good as the other elite TEAMS (not just club / name / reputation) across Europe.

Look, I'm getting really tired of this argument. Jose has had plenty of money to spend, he chose to buy Lukaku who quite frankly isn't good enough. He's had 7/8 of the players he wanted and we still look nowhere near the finished article. If his coaching was better and he got the maximum out of the current squad we'd be a lot better off than we are just now. It's really not just about money, we don't look like a coherent team with a plan.

Yes, City have spent more and the squad was further ahead anyway, but to see Jose getting no blame on here just amazes me.

Seems like he's cooled down quite a bit. Did a lot of defending of the club and the players in this presser.

Well Jose -spending money is not always the answer as you rightly said, we have limits.
Try to use our youth system and go for unproven cheap players who can be solid back ups.

Bollocks.

One of the best I have heard from Jose in the embargoed section. Honest, from the heart. unfortunately ass always Jose's critics will pounce on him and twist his words and start bashing him without even reading fully what he is saying.

You don't hire Mourinho and then don't back him.

You can only do that once you have a solid spine and to build a spine you need to spend big. We needed a proper number 9 and there were not many so we had to shell out big. We needed a proper creative midfielder and we got Pogba and for that we had to shell big. Now we have to replace Carrick and once we do that then he can add fringe players. This is why I said in some other thread, we did not grow as a team from 2013-16. Now Jose is playing catch up.

Agree and no complaints on our transfer business for me.
We just need to do our business more smartly (the ones outside bigger names)

He plays Rashford every game. He wants to keep and make use of Fellaini. Blind, Darmian etc who are average squad players are made use of. Young plays LB. He tried to get ahead of the pack and sign Lindelof for the future. McTominay has been given games. He wanted to keep Pereira.

I dont know what "cheap" is anymore tbh. What is cheap now? £30 million?

I am pretty sure this is him done here, he is desperate for a club to spend 500 million or whatever, and he knows they won't do that, so he is making excuses for himself. Talking absolute rubbish at this point, he had my support until now but these interviews lately about transfers have been childish and make no sense at all.

He is not saying he wants the club to spend 500 million. He is asking for patience to build a squad because he cannot do it all at once.

We have backed him though? I really don't get this notion he hasn't been backed. He's also saying he'll continue to be backed, so next year at this time if we are in a similar position who's fault will it be then?

So who is the big money megastar we sign in the summer do we think?

Exactly. Its a shame people do not want to even read what he is saying. That was one of the best I have heard Jose say, from the heart. But unfortunately Jose's critics are twisting his words and bashing him by making their own things up like he wants to leave, he is complaining about money blah blah.

I don't know where we will be next year but one this is for sure, whoever takes over from Jose (whenever that be) will have a better squad to manage as compared to what Jose had.

I haven't noticed him implying that anywhere, but just moaning about how he can't spend as much as City and pretty much saying we cannot catch them. I am really disappointed our manager thinks like this.