One accepted untruth in football is Mourinho went to a shit Inter and won the cl through his sheer brilliance alone. Just take a quick google of that squad he got at Inter, it is a dream team almost. This was a fantastic team seriously under performing. If the Italians have one thing it is a deep tactical positional attitude to the game, add Mourinho to that and it is a match made in heaven. That squad had the skill and nouse to win a cl, they just needed direction which Mourinho gave.
At utd he has Pogba who takes up a very important position for his style. If you think of a bit of mechano you built as a kid that had some flexibility but could revert back to it's primary shape with ease. Pogba especially is a wayward hinge that stops that primary shape coming back together for example when they are being countered and need a solid defensive shape quick. Pogba is rarely where he should be in high tempo pieces of play and for Mourinho's percentage football this is a really big issue. It compromises everything when he relies on players being inch perfect ready to pounce and create a solid defensive barrier.
All that goes to say Mourinho has hurdles he could do without. As much as Woodward will have patted himself on the back for getting Pogba and getting very friendly calls of sponsors noting their pleasure at the deal. He has also placed obstacles in the managers way. Keeping Pogba happy but keeping him out the way of big matches without having a huge press thing kick off etc. It is almost a job in its self managing the dabber let alone the rest of the team. Matic bless his cotton socks is a decent player who has a mistake in him these days but over all is decent. He can see he needs to cover Pogba but simply does not have the legs for it, he never has had any really and what he did have are already gone.
Then you look elsewhere on the pitch and see no clear idea or structure anywhere else either really; that it is not just Pogba. Players bought simply to frustrate rivals at extreme expense; players stagnating when they should be really kicking on or at least finding some identity in their play, they are not. Their players look like they are at 100% just keeping their shit together on the pitch. How can they be expected to help out someone who is such a positionaly poor player in such a major position if they are barely keeping their own head above water?
They may be second but i think hey are going full steam ahead this season, the ducks feet can go no faster. Some here think you could give Pep that Utd squad and they would be where we are now; i don't think that is right.
Rashford is a very basic and limited player, Martial should have his face on the side of a milk carton, Mata is agar jelly, an inert base of blandness; Fellaini is just limited and tries his best; opta need a theodolite to get accurate stats on Matic with their keeper likely to be their player of the season for the 4th year running. They would be much better but i doubt they would be meeting us eye to eye, we have exceptional individual talents. Martial and Rashford will never be as good a pair as Sterling and Sane for example, they just don't have it in them. This is before we get to David Silva, KDB, fernandinho, Walker etc.
For a team that finds it's self in second i don't think they could ask for much more unless they did indeed have a Pep clone.
