WHY SAY ANYTHING?

Paul Pogba could be about to join the list of “star” players who have joined Manchester United and left a relatively short while later.

His name could be added to those of Angel Di Maria, Juan Verón, Zlatan Ibrahimović, Henrikh Mkhitaryan and Henrik Larsson to name but a few. Their spells at the club were short for different reasons but, nevertheless, they were still short.

Pogba, unlike some of Mourinho’s other sales, was a star when he arrived at Old Trafford for his “second coming”. The likes of Kevin De Bruyne, Mohamed Salah and Romelu Lukaku had not yet reached that status when sold by Mourinho during his time as Chelsea manager.

As everybody is aware, the United manager has a very erratic history in the transfer market and has certainly sold some players he probably now wishes he would have kept.

It is yet to be proven whether or not he was right, for example, to sell Henrikh Mikhtaryan to Arsenal and the wisdom or otherwise of his decision will only become evident over the next season or two and, probably, after Arséne Wenger has departed.

The fact is that selling Pogba would be admitting to a massive mistake! An £89 million mistake for which the majority of fans will probably forgive him providing he gets the money back and then spends it wisely although, with Mourinho, there is no guarantee of either.

It should also be remembered that Pogba appears to have been an Ed Woodward signing. As we have stated in the past, Woodward gets far too involved in which players should be bought and his manager has already openly admitted that it was “100% Woodward” responsible for Alexis Sánchez moving to United from Arsenal.

The problem is that if Mourinho was to be left alone to deal with the transfers he would likely bankrupt the club even quicker than Woodward is doing!

Kevin De Bruyne…..

Staying on the subject of Mourino for a little longer and his ex-Chelsea player has been setting the record straight on their relationship, both now and while they were together at Stamford Bridge.

When asked about being sold to Wolfsburg in 2014, his reply was philosophical, to say the least.

“I really don’t care,” the 26-year-old says. “It’s just part of football – it goes up and down. In the 10 years I’ve been playing, nine and a half years have been up and a half year has been a bit down.

“I can be really happy with the way it’s gone because a lot of people go up and down, up and down. I’ve had the feeling that gradually I’ve got better and better. That was an experience where I learned maybe the most out of how football goes, how I go with the situation. I was only 21 at the time – no one is going to play all the time at that age. If I see the amount of games I’ve played in my career it’s a lot, so I’m happy.”

Of course, the Belgian has gone on to become one of the best players in the Premier League and is only now reaching his peak so it does cast a little shadow on Mourinho’s decision to sell him before he even had a chance at Chelsea.

As usual, the Portuguese was impatient and wasn’t prepared to wait for De Bruyne to come good. He would rather sell him and use the money to buy an established player who could go straight into the first team.

At present, it is Kevin De Bruyne who appears to have the best of the deal!

And finally…..

Jürgen Klopp has admitted that the idiots who ambushed Manchester City’s team bus have soured what should have been a great occasion. We are not aware of any psychological damage the attack may have had on the players but something certainly had a negative affect on their performance and the 3-0 loss may even be enough to see them exit the competition so, in that respect, the lunatic fringe have won.

Hopefully, Manchester City supporters will prove themselves to be above the scum who carried out the planned attack in Liverpool and will not retaliate and, that being the case, they will deserve to progress and will win the second leg 5-1.

You have been told!