Mourinho relishes United’s win

EUROPA FINAL Manager celebrates exuberantly as Red Devils secure Champions League berth with 20 victory over Ajax

Manchester United manager Jose Mourinho said his side’s season had been a triumph of pragmatism over poetry following their Europa League success against Ajax in Stockholm.

In a poignant match scarred by Monday’s terror attack in Manchester, which left 22 people dead, United prevailed 2-0 via goals from Paul Pogba and Henrikh Mkhitaryan to win the tournament for the first time.

Mourinho has received criticism over the quality of United’s football and sixth-place finish in the Premier League, but he finishes his maiden season with three trophies and a place in next season’s Champions League.

“The poets are the ones that win every match,” said the Portuguese, who had previously led United to success in the Community Shield and League Cup.

“I think I am going to have one of these jobs in a few years. I always lose matches, but some guys win every time and I don’t.

“But in a bad season, in a season where sometimes I felt my team is the worst in the world and I am the worst manager in the world, we won three trophies and go to the Champions League by winning a trophy.

“Not by finishing second or third or fourth, and we have the honour of going to the Super Cup. So the season was the victory of pragmatism and the people who respect the opponent and try to exploit the opponents’ weakness. Based on pragmatism and humble principles. Not poets.”

The United manager celebrated Wednesday’s victory exuberantly at the Friends Arena, at one point being bundled to the turf in an embrace with his jubilant son. A two-time European champion with Porto and Inter Milan, Mourinho once declared he did not want to win the Europa League, saying success in the competition would be a “big disappointment”.

He has now won the tournament twice, having led Porto to glory in the UEFA Cup — as the Europa League was previously called — in 2003.

“To me it is the most important trophy of my career because it is the last (most recent),” he said.