Daily Star

NO TIME TO REST

Mourinho moans over ‘unfair’ festive fixtures

- By JEREMY CROSS

JOSE MOURINHO has rapped the Premier League for ruining Manchester United’s Christmas.

Mourinho’s men face four games in nine days over the festive period, starting with today’s trip to Leicester.

They will have less rest between matches than some of their rivals, including runaway league leaders Manchester City.

The United boss has accused the Premier League of punishing his club, while handing some of his topsix rivals an unfair advantage, a claim posted on the club’s website.

United trail City by 11 points at the top and face an uphill battle to catch them.

Mourinho is worried his stars will have less rest during the busiest time of the season, but said: “We are not the only ones.

“There are other teams in the same situation as we are and Leicester are one of them.

“We did the simple objective study and there is a big gap, a really big gap, between some clubs and other clubs. There are clearly the ones that are ® really privileged and there are clearly another group that are really punished by the decisions of the calendar.

“There are another group in the middle where I would like to be. I know I would never be in the top group, but in the middle group we would like to be.”

Mourinho, meanwhile, insists he won’t be rushed into swinging the axe in the wake of his side’s shock defeat at Bristol City in the

Carabao Cup quarter-finals. Some fans want him to sell underperfo­rming trio Matteo Darmian, Henrikh Mkhitaryan and Daley Blind in next month’s transfer window. But Mourinho won’t rush any big moves, saying: “I don’t make decisions based on only one game or one feeling or one night. “It is one of the beautiful things that can happen, when a team from a lower division kills the giant. “Football has changed so much, with the lower divisions being more profession­al, and it could happen even more. “I could be critical with my players, but they did enough to win. So we move on and we move on quickly, because we have another match.”

 ??  ?? JET-SETTER JOSE: United chose to fly the short hop to Leicester and here’s Jose Mourinho directing operations before the journey ... which took all of 15 minutes!
JET-SETTER JOSE: United chose to fly the short hop to Leicester and here’s Jose Mourinho directing operations before the journey ... which took all of 15 minutes!

Newspapers in English

Newspapers from United Kingdom