Mourinho Blasts Media And Pundits Again; Defends Rooney's Form

Manchester United boss Jose Mourinho has hit back at the media and pundit for criticising him and his team.


“I am such a lucky guy,” Mourinho said on Friday during his press conference ahead of Saturday’s Premier League clash with Leicester at Old Trafford.
“I can’t be upset with anything. The only thing that upsets me a little bit is the kind of criticism for my players.

“I would love to protect my players, but from you (the media) I can’t. It is completely out of my control. That gives me a feeling that it is hard. That is frustrating.

“The Einsteins (journalists / pundits) need money to live. They can’t coach, they can’t be on the bench, they can’t win matches. They can speak, they can write.

“They can criticise the work of other people. But I am a good man. I am a man of goodwill. I do lots of charity work. I am helping so many people. Why not also help feed the Einsteins.”

 When asked whether champions Leicester can win the Premier League again, Mourinho replied: “It is very difficult to retain the title.

“History says that. Not many in the Premier League have done it. One team was Manchester United and another was managed by the worst manager in history of football (talking about when he retained the title with Chelsea).

“I look at Leicester and they are very good. They won the Premier League because some of the big teams were not good enough last season. It is very easy to analyse and understand.

“Leicester are very good, they are a very easy team to analyse and understand, their attacking organisation is difficult to cope with.

“They are easy to understand, difficult to play against.”

Mourinho revealed that Anthony Martial will not be fit for the match after the forward copped a calf injury in the defeat at Watford.

“You guys are confusing concussion with contusion,” he said.

Mourinho, who has openly called out Henrikh Mkhitaryan, Jesse Lingard and Luke Shaw this season, defends his criticism of players.

When asked about criticising his players, the United manager said: “It’s a learning process, you make a mistake, especially individual mistakes then you have to learn.

“A team that works to a game plan during the week, you try to identify agreements between us and then individual mistake punishes you.

“Criticism is part of the process, it helps them learn how to deal with criticism from you (the media).”

Mourinho then defended captain Wayne Rooney, who has been in poor form as United suffered three sttaight defeats.

He added: “Rooney form is Man United form, we are a team, we are not Wayne Rooney.

“We like to say a very good start to the season was better than we could expect, we were guilty to raise expectations of people.

“We were punished by the fact we only played well for moments, in football you have to be consistent during 90 minutes.”