Mourinho happy with Lukaku’s display, deems Pogba surplus to requirements
Manchester United suffered a 3-1 hammering at the hands of the Liverpool at Anfield in the Premier League on Sunday. The 3-1 loss marked Jose Mourinho’s 7th defeat of the Premier League campaign and the Red Devils lost further ground on the top-four in the standings.
Liverpool were by far the better side and created a lot more chances than the visitors. The Reds made their territorial domination count as Sadio mane opened the scoring just 24 minutes into the game. However, United got a lifeline when Alisson’s error allowed Jesse Lingard to restore parity at the 33rd-minute mark.
United were never really in the game and substitute Xherdan Shaqiri sealed the game for the hosts with two deflected finishes. Jurgen Klopp’s side once again finished the week atop the Premier League standings while United fell 11 points behind 4th placed Chelsea.
Paul Pogba watched from the sidelines as the Red Devils were at the receiving end of some free-flowing attacking football from the hosts. When asked about the Frenchman’s exclusion from the eleven, Mourinho said, ” Because I am happy with [Nemanja] Matic, Lingard and [Ander] Herrera.”
Romelu Lukaku had a poor game and managed just 20 touches over the course of the 90 minutes. He struggled to get into the game and had virtually no impact.
However, Mourinho did not share the same view and he was pretty happy with his No.9 showing at Anfield. The Portuguese gaffer said,” “I think he didn’t have a bad game at all. I think he fought hard, he had good movement, he set up the goal.”
He further added, ” He gave more problems today than last season when he came for the 0-0 draw. He was lively, he had movement and good interaction.”
“Sometimes his first touch is not the best and he loses lots of balls, but today that didn’t happen.
“He had some good links and fought hard. He’s improving, he played positively in the last game against Fulham and today was a very difficult match to play. I think he was positive.”
