In memouriam
> Spurs tear United apart to ensure questions and criticism will come thick and fast for Jose <
IT WAS a night that got so bad for Jose Mourinho that the question very quickly went from “how many?” to “how long left?” That is a story we’ve seen before with the Portuguese, but it did come from a ruthless result we haven’t seen in some time.
Mauricio Pochettino claimed his first goals and first points as a Tottenham Hotspur manager at Old Trafford, but even the brutal way they cut Manchester United apart with a brilliant 3-0 win will pale next to all of the questions and criticisms now must come about the Portuguese and those fatal third seasons.
That may be harsh on Spurs, but that’s the thing. This was mostly down to United’s flaws, and about United.
With the home fans unable to face up to what was actually happening on the pitch, as so many streamed out following man-of-the-match Lucas Moura’s cutting late third goal, these are now questions that are impossible for the club not to face up to.
Some did stay to sing the manager’s name, it must be acknowledged, and he did acknowledge them – although very plaintively.
His attitude away from the cameras will be very interesting.
Executive vice-chairman Ed Woodward will now have even more to think about; Mourinho more to growl about.
The Portuguese will rightfully look to some of his hapless players, not least that defence that he did want replaced, but he should also look to himself.
There are bigger problems here than a porous backline. That the response to the first goal was that calamitous should be a huge alarm. United just fell in on themselves, in a
manner – yes – reminiscent of Mourinho and Chelsea 2015-16. It brought his current club’s worst start since 1992-93.
They signed Eric Cantona then, solving an obvious issue. It’s difficult to know what Mourinho will do, though, especially since he himself doesn’t seem to know how to respond. There are so many issues, not least his own very responses to them.
To qualify some of the criticism of Mourinho, it was difficult not to wonder whether that outof-nowhere opening goal might have been scored had he got the authoritative centrehalf he wanted – like, say, Toby Alderweireld.
There are now so many problems with Mourinho’s team, but it was similarly one of those nights that provoke these debates over Romelu Lukaku’s exact level as a striker.
How different it could have been had he properly punished the worst of Danny Rose errors in the first half, Harry Kane’s efficiency at the other end emphasising it all the more? Just as it might have been different had Alderweireld
started in the United side.
Mourinho will naturally point to such knifeedge moments as the ultimate cause of defeat but that was the repeated case in that 2015-16 campaign, and there’s a fair argument that United should be a more fortified and confident team after two years under the Portuguese.
Instead, United just re-emphasised how they’re going to be there for the taking every game this season – at least under these circumstances.
And that will provoke those bigger questions.
By the end, Spurs were so comfortable that you would never have thought they had lost more times at this stadium than any other Premier League club had at any other away ground since the 1992 breakaway.
They had been allowed to boss the pitch, make it their own.
They were in control – something that really cannot be said of Mourinho and his management right now.
So... how long will this pitch be his own? – The Independent