MOURINHO HAPPY TO PROGRESS IN TOP SPOT
UNITED BOSS STARTS DERBY MIND GAMES AFTER TOPPING CHAMPIONS LEAGUE GROUP
Manchester United clinched top spot in Champions League Group A, showing character to come from behind to beat CSKA Moscow 2-1 at Old Trafford last night.
It was always a case of when rather than if United progressed to the last 16, where the hosts recovered from Alan Dzagoev’s opener to defeat CSKA with secondhalf goals from Romelu Lukaku and Marcus Rashford.
Jose Mourinho’s men finished three points clear of Basel after their club recordequalling 40th successive unbeaten home match.
“I’m really happy because we don’t want to qualify with a defeat,” Mourinho said after United reached the last 16 for the first time since 2013-14.
“We don’t want to qualify with a bad performance so the objective was to qualify playing well and to get at least a positive result.
“We did that very, very well. The performance was good, the attitude was good.
“Half-time, we were losing but playing well, I was not unhappy with the players at all.
“In the second half, we had that strong reaction – we didn’t want to lose the match.
“The team in the second half, they showed the desire of not qualifying with a defeat, we could lose four or five-nil and qualify but that was not the objective. The objective was to play well and win and we managed both.”
Mourinho notably had kind words for Luke Shaw.
The 22-year-old has been criticised by the United boss and restricted to just two sub appearances this season, yet the left-back produced a manof-the-match display In his first start for 219 days.
“Very, very positive performance, especially with the ball going forward,” he said of Shaw. “Really dangerous, creating a lot, great intensity in his game.
“No surprise that in minute 80 he is feeling the consequences of that intensity (by suffering cramp).
“It is normal, the first match of the season for him, but he was deserving of that opportunity for quite a long time. And he’s going to get more because the performance was really positive.”
Mourinho began the Manchester derby mind games by dismissing Pep Guardiola’s suggestion David Silva could miss City’s Premier League trip to United on Sunday – having seen Arsenal’s Alexandre Lacazette ruled out last week but still play against United.