Mourinho: Pogba needs time to adjust in England
JOSE MOURINHO believes Paul Pogba needs more time to re-adjust to English football after the France international scored twice in Manchester United’s 4-1 Europa League win over Fenerbahce.
The world’s most expensive player, who returned to Old Trafford from Juventus in the summer, opened the scoring with a penalty before netting a second with a long-range strike after Anthony Martial had doubled the lead with another spot-kick.
Jesse Lingard added the fourth early in the second half, before former United forward Robin van Persie bagged a consolation.
Speaking about Pogba, Mourinho said: “Two days ago, he was the worst player of the Premier League and 48 hours later he’s phenomenal. He needs time. I was not expecting [him to adjust] in a click of fingers.”
Mourinho also insisted Pogba was his side’s penalty taker, with captain Wayne Rooney having taken them in the past.
“The first penalty taker was Paul,” he said.” He probably didn’t want to repeat it because it’s a second penalty a couple of minutes later. “Martial was the one that had the previous action and Martial also is a good penalty taker.”
The win puts United level on six points with Feyenoord who top Group A after Mourinho’s men were beaten by the Dutch side in the opening round of matches.
Old Trafford stood to applaud Van Persie’s late strike but Mourinho was not so impressed.
“I’m never happy to concede a goal, especially if the goal is not a perfect one. The important thing is we have six points.”
Earlier, Southampton suffered a sucker punch in the San Siro after Antonio Candreva’s second-half goal secured a 1-0 victory for Inter.
Elsewhere, Dundalk lost two goals in six minutes to slump to a 2-1 defeat in Dublin against Zenit St Petersburg after Patrick McEleney had put them ahead.