Jose Mourinho accused his Manchester United players of lacking commitment and said they deserved to lose against Fenerbahce for treating the Europa League group game as a "summer friendly".
United went behind after 69 seconds when Moussa Sow gave Dick Advocaat's side the lead with an spectacular overhead kick in a 2-1 defeat for United. Fenerbahce's second goal came from an equally impressive Jeremain Lens free-kick in the 58th minute before Wayne Rooney scored a late consolation.
An awful night for Mourinho and his team was compounded by Paul Pogba limping off before the half hour and his availability for the trip to Swansea City on Sunday is in doubt.
Mourinho, though, was clear where culpability lay for a shambolic display. “They deserved to win,” he said. “Football is not just about quality - it is about effort and commitment, it is about playing to your limits. In an atmosphere like this, to concede an early goal gives the opposition exactly what they want. The opponent can then defend and counterattack us with a lead and that is our fault for letting them be in that situation.
“They were playing a Champions League final and we were playing a summer friendly by the way the game started. After their second goal we reacted and could have got a different result but I didn’t feel we deserved more as over the 90 minutes we didn’t play well enough. We didn’t fully play to our maximum.”
Mourinho was unhappy United did not heed his pre-game message. “I am disappointed as I have quite a big experience of playing against Turkish teams,” he said. “I pass to the players all my experience, and my experience is that when you play against them at home it’s easy always - 2-0 or 4-0. You come to Turkey and it’s a completely different story. I told them to wait for that and not be focused on an easy game - be ready for completely different game but we started the game sleeping.”
Rooney’s goal was only his second in four games for United. Mourinho said: “We are not scoring goals, that’s the reality, but we produced, we create. We had enough chances. We had great positions to score, headers not going in direction of the ball, bad passes in the final third, shots that could hit the target and didn’t.”
Mourinho pointed to injuries to Eric Bailly and Chris Smalling at centre-back, saying the combination of Daley Blind and Marcos Rojo as their replacements hampered the team. “It is difficult to cope, having to play with two left-backs at centre-back,” he said. “This makes it tough to cope with the physicality of the game.
“I know we have a problem and especially away from home - its difficult to play with two proper central defenders. Football starts with a goalkeeper and two strong central defenders. We are playing with two left-backs and Blind is having to play central defender on the right side [which hampered him even more].”
The defeat leaves United third in GroupA with six points, one behind Fenerbahce and Feyenoord. If they are to guarantee passage to the knockout stage United must win their last two games - against the Dutch team at Old Trafford and away at Zorya in Ukraine.
Of their qualification hopes, Mourinho said: “We don’t depend on the others, we depend on ourselves. If we win both games we qualify. Even with four points we could qualify, since Feyenoord play Fenerbahce and both sides cannot get maximum points.
“Honestly I think we are in a better situation than Fenerbahce. Fenerbahce have seven points - even if they beat Zorya at home we go to the last game. It’s impossible for Feyenoord and Fenerbahce to win the same match [when they play each other]. We depend only on us. We don’t need to wait for results or know what is going to happen.”
Henrikh Mkhitaryan came on in the second half for a first appearance since being taken off at half-time during the defeat against Manchester City at home on September 10th. The Armenian failed to make an impact. Asked of his thinking regarding the forward, Mourinho said: “He has to do more. It’s as simple as that.
“We have big expectations in the club and lots of players for these positions. He has to pay better than Juan Mata, Jesse Lingard and Anthony Martial, and it’s a simple as that. Every manager in the world wants to win matches and play the players he thinks can help the team and I’m no different.”
Guardian Service
