‘Mourinho is outdated’

Jose Mourinho

Former Manchester United winger, Lee Sharpe, believes Jose Mourinho’s style of football is outdated and ineffective, suggesting the ‘Special One’ has been left behind by rival coaches Pep Guardiola and Jurgen Klopp.

Mourinho is under huge pressure at Old Trafford after a shock 3-1 defeat to West Ham on Saturday meant United have suffered their worst start to a season in 29 years.

Many have pointed the finger at United’s players for their poor start to the campaign, but Sharpe believes the manager is struggling to get the best out of the wealth of creative talent at his disposal at the club, and that his trademark defensive style just isn’t suited to the modern game anymore.

“The thing with Mourinho is his football has always been on the defensive side,” the ex-United star said on Monday’s Alan Brazil Sports Breakfast.

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“When he was at Chelsea he was very defensive and he liked to play two holding midfielders, and it was good in the era that he was successful at Chelsea.

“But now Guardiola and Klopp have come in and shown that high-tempo, high-pressing, quick-passing and quick-moving football is more successful, and I think Mourinho is struggling with his creativeness.

“He’s got some unbelievable forward-thinking, attacking players in his team and he doesn’t seem to get the best out of them.

“They’re not creating enough chances, they’re not scoring enough goals and they’re giving too many goals away – that’s never going to win you anything.

“Alexis Sanchez was unbelievable at Arsenal, Marcus Rashford has been fantastic but only plays bit parts of games and comes in and out. Anthony Martial is the same, he’ll play a couple of games and then get left out for a couple and that makes it really hard to get any consistency going.

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“He’s not getting the best out of his players, there’s a lack of confidence in the squad and there’s an upset in there because of the Pogba situation.

“It’s just a bit messy and unsavoury at the moment.”

Sporting Tribune