Pogba has Liverpool in his sights...
Solskjaer happy to indulge star’s online obsession in return for net gains
NOTHING underscores the transformation of Manchester United more than Paul Pogba. Signed to add glamour and purpose to the club, the last days of Jose Mourinho saw him reduced to sitting mournfully on the bench. As such, any frivolous post on social media, usually a goal celebration routine with Jesse Lingard, would invariably provoke a backlash from frustrated fans.
At the first instalment of this fixture at Anfield just before Christmas, he was an unused substitute, Mourinho explaining he had several better players at his disposal. By the following weekend, the manager would be gone, Pogba would be restored to the team and instrumental to United’s 5-1 win over Cardiff.
It might seem simple but getting £89million players to perform is part of the job spec. Ole Gunnar Solskjaer has done that, which presumably is one of the key criteria when Ed Woodward appoints a fulltime manager. In essence, Solskjaer has harnessed the extrovert nature of Pogba and ensured it is more than an Instagram caricature. United actually signed him partly to be a driving force of the social media posts Woodward so values. The difference now is that he is a driving force on the pitch, with the performance against Chelsea on Monday night one of his best yet.
‘Paul has always been a largerthan-life character,’ says Solskjaer, who managed him briefly for United reserves in 2010 during the Frenchman’s first spell at the club.
‘He has a fantastic family but you don’t do yourself any favours (by overdoing social media). You don’t want to give anyone an excuse, really. So, of course, you don’t go to the Brit Awards this week.
‘We know leading up to the other game against Liverpool there were stories about players not being focused. It is not about that. We know they are focused, we know they are doing their best but he does help himself by toning it down a bit.
‘But that is just Paul being Paul. Knowing him, he wants to win, he wants to be the best. And you would be surprised by the number of minutes he’s played.
‘Apart from David de Gea and maybe Nemanja Matic, he has played the most minutes for us in the league. There was a perception that Jose left him out all the time.’
Maybe. But Pogba and Mourinho had become a sideshow that was sapping energy from the club. And
Pogba has yet to be afforded his own individual song by United’s hardcore fans. That speaks to the scepticism about the extroverted Parisien’s performances prior to the last two months. Now there is the synergy which was always envisioned when it returned.
In reality, Pogba is on Instagram as much if not more than he was prior to Mourinho’s exit. However, allied with inspirational performances on the pitch, it is much less of an issue.
‘I have not said anything to him about it,’ said Solskjaer. ‘I have talked to the whole team about expectations and standards and what I expect from them. I am a bit older than them and don’t understand all
Paul spends a lot of energy being a leader on and off the pitch
this social media.’ Solskjaer is being disingenuous. In March last year, when United won this fixture 2-1 with two goals from Marcus Rashford, he posted a photo of Rashford’s shirt draped over the TV as he watched the game in Molde.
Then he was a fan. It hardly seemed realistic to imagine he would be managing the team a year later.
‘Even though I posted that picture, it was maybe was one of my five or six tweets ever,’ added Solskjaer.
Yet when Mourinho complained about the era of a kind of footballer who has 6.1million Instagram followers, it was hard not to think he was simply a man out of time and simply aghast at the fact that young people simply had more media power in this age.
Still, there are positives to the digital age. The YouTube clip of Pogba filmed before the World Cup final for France against Croatia last summer showed the world what he might be given the chance. He is stood in the dressing room and all eyes are on him. More experienced and older players hang on his every word as he urges them to seize this once-in-a-lifetime moment.
‘He is a leader in training, he is a leader in the dressing room,’ said Solskjaer. ‘Players are allowed to be themselves. He spends a lot of energy being a leader on and off the pitch … the nice car, different haircut.
‘It has never been a problem with Paul.’
Of course, more will be demanded of Pogba. Paris Saint-Germain shut him down effectively to the extent that his frustration possibly contributed to his red card. Better teams will stretch him and be the measure of whether he can be judged a United great.