JOSE’S FURY
Mourinho raps ref as Guardiola gets the better of his old rival
De Bruyne such a pain for Mourinho as Pep’s City edge derby thriller
IN truth, Pep Guardiola was only half right. He had insisted before this game it wasn’t about the managers, it was about the players. But there is reason why Jose Mourinho and Guardiola are the most-feted managers in the game right now.
As yet, they haven’t made their full impact on these clubs. That will come. But in the week in which Paul Scholes correctly observed that the standard of Premier League games is well below the best from overseas, this at least felt like an appetiser for a forthcoming feast.
It wasn’t perfect. There were too many stray passes and hacked clearances for that. And there was Claudio Bravo struggling to acclimatise and Henrikh Mkhitaryan just struggling. But it was very good: absorbing from start to finish, even without the multiple Machiavellian subplots. It entertained and not just in that blood-and-fury Premier League way, though it had that as well.
There was Kevin De Bruyne exuding quality; there was Zlatan Ibrahimovich’s finish on the half volley, though he missed several others; there was David Silva’s subtle prompting and there was Marcus Rashford’s youthful zeal.
In the end there was a City victory, though United had done enough to persuade that they could at least be on a par with their rivals this season. And there was an Old Trafford crowd which sounded and felt like something from another era, when passion was less manufactured and belief more ingrained.
And overseeing it were two managers with the strongest personalities and best records in the game. In the first half, City had the Pep effect in full. There was smooth passing, intense pressing and tactical structure which had Mourinho bamboozled and his initial selection exposed. City came close to planting their flag in the Old Trafford centre circle and taking permanent ownership of the game.
Then came the fightback, orchestrated by Wayne Rooney and Ibrahimovich, initially, but then supplemented by Mourinho. His mistakes were acknowledged, the substitutions made at half-time with Mkhitaryan and Jesse Lingard off and Rashford and Ander Herrera on. Rooney and Rashford went wide and Paul Pogba moved into an attacking role.
So effective were the changes and so quickly did the game change in United’s favour, that Guardiola had to respond. On came an extra holding midfielder in Fernando and De Bruyne nominally took up duties as a No 9. It was a fascinating duel.
Guardiola is hoping that the fascination with personality will pass. ‘I don’t know if he respects me,’ he said, though Mourinho had waited to embrace his former Barcelona colleague, pointedly the last man out of the tunnel at the start, and the exchange seemed warm enough. ‘But I respect him a lot,’ continued Guardiola. ‘What happened has happened. We are adults. He’s a father, I’m a father. He wants to win and I want to win. He beats me, I beat him. In the future I’m going to beat him, he’s going to beat me. But I try to stay focused on my players.
‘Hopefully the next time we play United, the people will start to forget to ask about our relations.’
Mourinho, predictably had his complaints, notably about referee Mark Clattenburg. He was less convincing talking about Nicolas Otamendi’s alleged handball than he was about Bravo’s uncontrolled dive at Rooney. But he also needed to acknowledge his own failings.
‘I think we did enough to change the result and the penalty and red card with 20 minutes to go, we are talking about a different match,’ he said. ‘We were punished by a bad first half — my responsibility — and we were punished by Mark with his bad decisions.’
And while he repeatedly tried to insist it wasn’t wholly about Mkhitaryan and Lingard, it is difficult to see Mourinho trusting them again any time soon. ‘I made a couple of decisions and I thought the individual qualities of certain players would give me what I wanted but I didn’t get it,’ he said. ‘I didn’t change after 20 minutes, because I didn’t want to destroy the players.
‘It was not just about Miki and Jesse. Other players weren’t playing well. I don’t like to single out players. Let’s say our team didn’t play well in the first half and the responsibility is mine. I think some of the boys felt the dimension of the game, the focus, the attention of the derby. Probably in the next big game I know who can accept well the dimension of the game.’
City were dominant initially, though they went all Wimbledon, circa 1989, for their first strike. Aleksandar Kolarov opted for a long, lofted clearance, Kelechi Iheanacho got the flick on and De Bruyne was in, courtesy of Daley Blind’s awful misreading of the situation. Spurned by Mourinho at Chelsea, the Belgian was cool with his two touches and neat finish to make it 1-0.
De Bruyne was the protagonist again on 36 minutes. His strike rebounded off the inside of the post but the hapless Blind played Iheanacho onside and from three yards out he turned the ball in. The takeover of Old Trafford was threatening to mimic the 2011 humiliation, when City won 6-1. It demanded a response and Mourinho made himself the catalyst, leaping from the bench in exaggerated fashion when David Silva tripped Antonio Valencia.
Rooney’s free-kick to Fellaini’s head at the far post was a delight. Bravo attempted to intercept, landed on his backside as Ibrahimovich met the half volley beautifully to drag United back into it after 42 minutes. He should have added two more before the break.
Mourinho’s substitutions helped further. Rashford scared the life out of Bacary Sagna and it seemed his moment had come on 70 minutes when he sprinted away, shot and saw the net ripple, but the ball had struck an offside Ibrahimovich.
Thereafter, City hit United on the break, De Bruyne finding a post and Fernandinho forcing a fine save from De Gea.
And at the end, those City players formed a huddle, celebrated with gusto and then went to acknowledge their supporters. They had won a significant battle but you suspect the war will be long and hard.