Mourinho pledges only ‘the truth’ on injuries
MANCHESTER, Uni t ed Kingdom: Manchester United manager Jose Mourinho has aimed a subtle dig at Pep Guardiola and Arsene Wenger by declaring he would only tell “the truth” about the fitness of his players.
United, who beat CSKA Moscow 2- 1 on Tuesday to reach the Champions League knockout rounds for the first time since 201314, face Guardiola’s Manchester City on Sunday seeking to cut their eight- point lead in the Premier League.
Mourinho suggested Guardiola was being less than truthful by expressing doubts about the fitness of David Silva and hinted Wenger had done the same with regard to Alexandre Lacazette prior to United’s 3-1 win at Arsenal on Saturday.
Asked to provide a fitness update on his squad, Mourinho told reporters at Old Trafford: “Do you want the truth? The truth is Eric Bailly no chance for the weekend. Phil Jones a chance. ( Marouane) Fellaini a chance.
“Zlatan ( Ibrahimovic) a big chance and ( Nemanja) Matic is injured, but will play for sure. I’m telling the truth. He’s injured, but he’ll play for sure. ( Michael) Carrick no chance. It’s the truth, eh? No stories of Lacazette, David Silva. All the truth.”
Wenger ruled Lacazette out of Arsenal’s meeting with United last weekend due to a groin injury, only for the French striker to play the full 90 minutes and score his side’s goal.
Mourinho joked Arsenal’s medical team had performed an “amazing” feat by turning Lacazette “from a no to a complete 90 minutes”.
Silva, meanwhile, has been left out of City’s squad for their game at Shakhtar Donetsk on Wednesday due to an unspecified injury, with Guardiola saying he does not know if the Spaniard will be fit for Sunday’s trip to Old Trafford.
One player unlikely to feature for United against City is left-back Luke Shaw, who has been frozen out by Mourinho but produced an enterprising display on his return to the starting XI against CSKA.
“Very positive performance, especially with the ball going forward,” Mourinho said of the England international.
“Really dangerous, creating a lot, great intensity in his game. No surprise that in minute 80 he’s feeling the consequences of that intensity. It’s normal – fi rst match of the season for him.
“He’s been deserving that opportunity for a long time and he’s going to get more because the performance was real ly positive.”
United fell behind late in the first half when Vitinho’s shot from Mario Fernandes’s cut-back struck team-mate Alan Dzagoev on its way into the net.
United turned the game around with two goals in two minutes from Romelu Lukaku and Marcus Rashford to progress to the last 16 as Group A winners.
Bayern Munich, Juventus and Real Madrid are among the teams United could now face in the next round, but Mourinho said his side would advance confident that they will inspire fear in their next opponents.
“I’m not the luckiest guy with draws, so it’s better I shut up and forget it because we only play in February and until then I have to concentrate on the English competitions,” he said.
“But I think it doesn’t matter the team we get in the draw. I think that team won’t be jumping with happiness to play against us.” — AFP LONDON: Australian Daniel Ricciardo replaced Red Bul l teammate Max Verstappen as Formula One’s pass master in 2017 but the season saw half the number of overtaking moves following the introduction of faster and wider cars.
According to figures released by tyre supplier Pirelli on Tuesday, there were a total of 435 overtakes over the 20 races.
In 2016, when there were 21 rounds, the sport racked up 866 moves.
That worked out at an average of 21.8 per race in 2017, compared to 41.2 last year.
Azerbaijan Grand Prix winner Ricciardo made 43 overtakes, including 13 at Silverstone where he went from 19th on the British GP starting grid to fi nish fi fth.
Verstappen, who topped last year’s Pirelli statistics with 78 passes in a season that also brought him a fi rst victory, managed only 22 this time around.
On the plus side, the 20-year- old Dutch driver tied with Mercedes’ four-time world champion Lewis Hamilton as the drivers who were overtaken least (twice in total).
The likely lack of overtaking had been flagged up before the season as a consequence of Formula One’s new-look cars which were faster through corners but harder to get past on slower circuits like Monaco.
The worst race for passing was the Russian Grand Prix, with just one overtake registered, while the liveliest was Azerbaijan’s chaotic race with 42.
Red Bull were the team with the most overtakes and, along with championship runners- up Ferrari, the ones who were passed the least.
An overtaking manoeuvre was deemed to be one that occurred during a complete fast lap, but not the fi rst of any race.
Any position changes due to major mechanical problems or drivers being lapped were not included.
Pirelli said pole position in 2017 was on average 2.450 seconds faster than in 2016, and the fastest race lap was on average 2.968 seconds quicker.
The highest speed recorded was 362.4 kph by Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel in Mexico.
Next season will see an even faster tyre introduced, with softer compounds generally. — Reuters
No stories of (Arsenal’s Alexandre) Lacazette, David Silva (Manchester City). All the truth. Jose Mourinho, Manchester United manager