‘DEVILS’ IN SPOTLIGHT
Agent’s bluster lands Pogba in hot water
The sense of turmoil engulfing Manchester United took another twist on Tuesday night when Paul Pogba’s future was thrust back under the spotlight by the unsettled midfielder’s agent during an attack on club great Paul Scholes.
Mino Raiola hit back at Scholes’s criticism of Pogba and “a lack of leaders” at United in the wake of their dismal 3-2 defeat away to Brighton and Hove Albion on Sunday with two posts on Twitter that prompted a backlash from former players, Gary Neville, Paul Ince and Mike Phelan, who also served as Alex Ferguson’s assistant manager.
Ince suggested United were now “becoming a laughing stock” and claimed “everything is a total mess” at the club. Copying in Pogba’s Twitter handle on the messages, Raiola wrote: “Some people need to talk for fear of being forgotten. Paul Scholes wouldn’t recognise a leader if he was in front of Sir Winston Churchill.”
In a sarcastic second tweet, Raiola added: “Paul Scholes should become sports director and advise Woodward to sell Pogba. Would be sleepless nights to find Pogba a new club.”
At a time when Pogba is keen to move to Spain, his relationship with manager Jose Mourinho is under real strain, Raiola has reportedly been negotiating terms with Barcelona, and the Old Trafford club are seeking the appointment of a technical director, the agent’s remarks are likely to do little for relations between the player and the club.
Although Scholes accused Pogba of having “a really poor game” against Brighton and being too inconsistent, he made no suggestion that the midfielder should be sold, which made Raiola’s choice of words all the more incendiary.
Raiola’s comments led Neville to urge Pogba to pull his agent into line. “Let’s hope @paulpogba leads up his agent and shuts him up!” Neville responded on Twitter later.
Ince echoed Neville’s remarks and told Raiola to “grow up”. “Hearing that Mino Raiola has criticised Paul Scholes is an interesting one – who is he to criticise him? He was an unbelievable player, and a leader,” said Ince, a former teammate of Scholes.
Pogba had made no response to either of Raiola’s tweets as of Tuesday night, his only social media post being to wish “Eid Mubarak” to his followers in reference to Eid al-Adha, the second of two Islamic holidays celebrated worldwide.
Phelan, a former United midfielder who spent 12 years at the club as first-team coach and later Ferguson’s number two, also took a dim view of Raiola’s tweets and effectively accused the agent of trying to drum up interest in his client rather than instructing the player to get his head down and focus on improving his form.
Ince believes United need to address the malaise urgently in order to avoid a situation similar to Chelsea in 2015, when Mourinho was sacked before Christmas. “Other clubs and fans are having a field day at the minute,” Ince told Paddy Power News.
“Should Mourinho leave? No. Should Man United as a club get their house in order? Absolutely. You would never have seen this going on with Sir Alex Ferguson.” — The Daily Telegraph
You would never have seen this going on with Sir Alex Ferguson