United ‘punished’ by fixtures – Mourinho
JOSE MOURINHO has questioned 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 matches in the space of 10 days.
United’s hectic festive spell begins with a trip to Leicester today, before home clashes with Burnley on December 26 and Southampton on December 30. A short journey to meet Everton follows 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 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 slight advantage over Mourinho’s side. Alongside Arsenal and Tottenham’s totals of nine, 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 the club faced “a harder time of it than our rivals towards the top of the table”. Mourinho echoed those same sentiments in his pre-Leicester press conference.
“We are not the only one, there are other teams in the same situation as we are. Leicester is one of them in the same situation,” he said. “We did a simple objective study on that and it’s a big gap – a really big gap – between some clubs and other clubs. There are clearly the ones that are really privileged, there is clearly another group that are really punished by the decisions of the calendar and another group in the middle of it where I would like to be.”
The United manager added: “I know that I will never be in the top group, but I would like to be in the middle group.”
When asked whether he was implying that organisers had deliberately given United fewer days rest, Mourinho didn’t comment. “It’s a good question. You want me to be punished again, right?”The Portuguese was reminded not to court controversy by the FA after escaping punishment for his remarks about referee Michael Oliver before the recent Manchester derby.
Mourinho confirmed that United will have to negotiate their Christmas ties without Antonio Valencia due to a hamstring injury. Eric Bailly, meanwhile, underwent surgery on his ankle yesterday and will be out for two to three months. (© Independent News Service)