SO WHAT IS WRONG WITH POGBA?
Sick £89m star back in training after Cup no-show But £75m Lukaku uses his brute force to ease Mourinho’s pain
PAUL POGBA is ready to return to action for Manchester United against Sevilla in the Champions League on Wednesday after resuming training yesterday.
Pogba reported for an 11am session just 24 hours after phoning in sick before United’s victory at Huddersfield.
His team-mates did not know Pogba was ill until they turned up at Carrington on Saturday morning, and then travelled to a hotel outside Huddersfield for a pre-match meal without him.
United took the unusual step of immediately announcing Pogba’s absence after manager Jose Mourinho had confirmed on Friday that he would play.
That followed speculation over Pogba’s future at Old Trafford after United’s record £89million signing was substituted in two of the previous three games and dropped to the bench for the other.
The Frenchman is now set to fly with the rest of the squad to Spain tomorrow for the first leg of the last-16 tie against Sevilla, and Mourinho will hope that quells talk of a falling-out with the underperforming star.
Speaking after the FA Cup win at Huddersfield — which set up a quarter-final tie at home to Brighton — the United boss (below) admitted that he did not know if Pogba would travel, but confirmed that Marcus Rashford, Antonio Valencia and Ander Herrera could all be available again.
Eric Bailly also returned to action as a late substitute after more than three months out with an ankle injury.
‘Look, today I didn’t rest one single player so we had every player available here,’ said Mourinho, who named Ethan Hamilton and Angel Gomes on the bench even though both youngsters had played for the Under 23s against Chelsea on Friday night. Hamilton only discovered that he had been promoted to the firstteam squad to replace Pogba when he turned up for a recovery session at Carrington the next morning.
‘Can we recover some of them for Wednesday?’ added Mourinho. ‘I believe so. I think Rashford, Herrera, Valencia have a chance. Paul, I don’t know.
‘Marcos Rojo, Phil Jones, Marouane Fellaini, Zlatan Ibrahimovic, I don’t think they have any chance, so we arrive at this crucial moment with some problems.
‘But, you know, I think mentality is very important. And we have a strong team mentality. We know it is a very difficult match, but we go for it.’
Between Pogba’s illness and another video referee debate, it would have been easy to overlook the fact that Romelu Lukaku won this tie for United with two well-taken goals early in either half.
The Belgium international has endured problems of his own this season when the goals dried up in October and November. The sulky striker, who refused to celebrate when he scored against Bournemouth and West Bromwich Albion before Christmas, looks more contented now.
He did what he does best here, charging on to through-balls from Juan Mata and Alexis Sanchez to beat goalkeeper Jonas Lossl with confident finishes. Lukaku has now scored six times in his last eight games, moving to 21 goals for the season. It means he has reached the 20 mark in all competitions for the fourth campaign in a row. There are those who will question if he has the finesse to be a truly world-class striker. Others will point to the 24-yearold’s reputation as a flat-track bully who still needs to produce this kind of form against the top teams.
It will be interesting to see how he performs against Sevilla and Chelsea in the Premier League on Sunday after dominating another of the smaller clubs.
‘He is our first striker and he is very important to us,’ said Nemanja Matic. ‘It’s good for his confidence that he’s scoring goals. He’s a great striker, very strong and he is still young. I am sure he will be important for us until the end of the season.’
Matic believes the decision of the video referee to disallow Mata’s effort for offside just before half-time took far too long, even though it turned out to be the correct call.
By the time Neil Swarbrick had studied the footage and informed referee Kevin Friend of the outcome, the players had been kept waiting for several minutes. ‘It was a little bit strange because you have to wait two minutes to see what happened,’ said Matic. ‘They have to do it in 30 seconds because after two minutes we are cold. Other than that, I like it. I think it will be better for football.’ Huddersfield could not make the most of the reprieve as they failed to reproduce their shock win over United in the Premier League in October. But there was enough confidence and enterprise in their performance to suggest that David Wagner’s side can beat relegation. Their next game is away to bottom club West Brom, whose problems have been exacerbated by the unruly behaviour of their players in Barcelona last week. ‘I heard they have some problems,’ said goalkeeper Lossl. ‘We know what West Brom normally stands for and that’s a big fight. But if we’re going to play like this in the last 11 games, we stand a good chance.’