Jose needs bit of divine help
Rafa is wary of takeover rumours There’s gold in Pierre’s boots…
BENITEZ: Player warning RAFA BENITEZ has warned Newcastle’s January transfer plans cannot be wrecked by takeover talk.
Mike Ashley has claimed he is closer than ever to selling up for £325million. But when a similar buy-out scenario unfolded a year ago Benitez struggled to get any money to spend.
The manager says “all the potential is there” for a new owner to exploit, but said it must be business as usual for him and his players.
Benitez said: “The potential, the city, it is there. I hope it will not be a distraction. Why? Because the players know they have to perform.
“When we say ‘business as usual’, it’s because we know that it will not change our plans. Our plans are to look for the transfer targets.
“We carry on thinking that Mike will be there, and we have to choose the right players for us.”
Newcastle have Atlanta United MLS star Miguel Almiron high up on their list. Details of a proposed move have been discussed, but Benitez said: “We have been here before. We will see where we can go.”
Newcastle face a tough trip to big-spending Everton tonight and Toffees manager Marco Silva says his side’s positive derby display at Liverpool shows they are improving.
Silva, who wants to make Andre Gomes’ loan move from Barcelona permanent, feels they can compete with the top sides.
“The fans want to see our team playing and fighting like we are doing, our players giving 100 per cent for the blue shirt,” he said. “We have to do everything we can to achieve results in this way and make the fans proud.” JOSE MOURINHO was a little unclear in his recollections whether he had said this week “a miracle” would be needed for Manchester United to reach the top four by the new year.
If he had, in an interview with a Brazilian TV station, he did not remember using the words exactly and it was not, so he said, what he truly believed.
Yet there is little doubt a touch of divine intervention would be helpful at home tonight as a team racked by injury and internal strife face up to a Unai Emery Arsenal side in the form of its life.
The injury crisis which on Saturday forced Mourinho to pitch two midfielders – Nemanja Matic and Scott McTominay – into the heart of defence shows no sign of abating.
Far from it, with Chris Smalling, Eric Bailly, Phil Jones, Victor Lindelof and Antonio Valencia “not playing” according to the manager, or possibly having to play through the pain barrier, and Luke Shaw “a doubt.” And Mourinho betrayed his frustration when he shut down a question from the club’s in-house broadcaster MUTV about his likely squad.
With two league points from their last nine, sitting eight points adrift of fourth spot, Arsenal are the last side United need to face with a patchwork defence.
Indeed, the image of Mourinho rummaging down the back of the Old Trafford sofa for spare defenders will fill Gunners fans with rare optimism at a venue where they have to go back to 2006-07 for their last league win with 11 matches since (eight home wins, three draws).
Arsenal could not arrive in better form, after beating Tottenham on Sunday off the back of an unbeaten run of 19 matches in all competitions going back to mid-August.
They also have the Premier League’s 10-goal leading marksman in Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang.
Mourinho said Arsenal were a “good team in a good moment” and while the jury remains out on whether this United team are the former they are definitely at an unhappy point in their season.
Mourinho did concede the target of a top-four finish had shifted for all that he was unclear on the specifics of what he said to Brazilian TV. “We are eight points from fourth so I don’t think we need a miracle at all,” he said. “We need a good run of results, not waste points we shouldn’t waste.
“Eleven days ago before the Crystal Palace game I said my hopes and targets were to be in that position at the end of December.
“The target has changed but let’s try to close the distance the best we can and
UNAI EMERY has challenged Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang to win the Premier League’s golden boot.
Aubameyang has emerged as the sharpest shooter in the league since his January arrival at Arsenal and is setting the pace in the race to be this season’s top scorer. The Gabon striker’s double against Tottenham made him the first player to reach double figures in the league this season. Since signing from Borussia Dortmund for
£56million nobody has scored more than Aubameyang’s 20 league goals.
Even more impressively, Aubameyang has the best minutes-to-goal ratio of all the league’s marksmen having scored once every 104 minutes and with each of his last
10 shots on target.
Manager Emery said: “I want him to continue improving and his challenge is also collective and individual.
“He has the possibility to be the best scorer in the Premier League. We want to help him to
achieve this and that is because if he is scoring he is helping us.”
Ahead of tonight’s trip to Old Trafford, Emery said: “He has played as a winger on the right, on the left and like a striker. He has played with two strikers. I use with him here every position.
“Sometimes his best performance is starting the match on the bench and then playing 20 or 25 minutes.
“In the last two matches he has had a very big performance. I want to say to him and also to everyone, ‘Don’t stop’.”
ADRIAN KAJUMBA