How should Mourinho fix Manchester United’s defence? By attacking | Jonathan Wilson


Manchester United seem incapable of doing the thing José Mourinho’s teams are renowned for so the manager must change his approach

There are times when you wonder whether the gods of football have almost too pronounced a sense of irony. Not content with a script that pitted an under-pressure José Mourinho against a series of ghosts of his past (Manuel Pellegrini, Rafa Benítez and Chelsea lining up like the conspirators around Julius Caesar, with Juventus, a club he clashed with repeatedly in Italy and now bolstered by his agent’s most high-profile other client, to come), they have devised a new torment for their plaything: his teams have become incapable of doing the thing he was renowned for getting his teams to do – defending.

Related: Maurizio Sarri admits Chelsea in wrong while José Mourinho accepts apology

When the problem is so clear, why does Mourinho keep playing in a way that accentuates his team’s flaws

Related: Chelsea 2-2 Manchester United: how the players rated at Stamford Bridge

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