United’s schedule is far tougher
JOSE Mourinho questioned yesterday whether a club he manages will ever come out on the right side of the Premier League’s Christmas fixture scheduling as his Manchester United side prepare to play their next four league matches in the space of 10 days.
United’s hectic festive period begins with a trip to Leicester City tonight, before home encounters with Burnley on Boxing Day and Southampton on De- cember 30, with a short journey to Goodison Park to meet Everton following soon after on New Year’s Day.
The tight scheduling means Mourinho’s players have a total of just six days to rest between games, three fewer than Arsenal, Tottenham Hotspur and West Ham United will enjoy over the same period.
Eight other Premier League clubs also have just six rest days to look forward to over Christmas, but all those expected to rival United for this season’s European places can boast a very slight advantage over Mourinho’s side.
Alongside Arsenal and Tottenham’s totals of nine, defending champions Chelsea have eight days to recover between their fixtures.
Liverpool and runaway league leaders Manchester City both have seven.
On Thursday, United bemoaned the scheduling in an article published on their official website, claiming that the club faced “a harder time of it than our rivals towards the top of the table”.