5 players thrown under the bus by Jose Mourinho | Premier League 2019-20

2. Luke Shaw

Luke Shaw often found himself under fire from Mourinho's barbs

Perhaps no other player came under fire from Mourinho during his time as Manchester United boss quite so much as young left-back Luke Shaw. Shaw had been signed from Southampton in the summer of 2014 for a fee of £30m – making him the world’s most expensive teenager – but injuries curtailed his early career at Old Trafford, meaning that by the time Mourinho arrived in the summer of 2016, he hadn’t quite established himself at the club.

Mourinho’s first season in charge of the Red Devils saw Shaw make just 19 appearances for the team – 11 in the Premier League – and a training ground bust-up reportedly saw the Portuguese criticise the former Southampton man’s work ethic. Mourinho later stated that he couldn’t compare the way Shaw trained with the training habits of his other players, as the left-back was so far behind.

Later he hit out at Shaw again; despite praising the youngster’s performance in a win over Everton as being good, this time Mourinho claimed that Shaw was playing “with his body and my brain”, stating that he was “making every decision for him” and that “he cannot play with my understanding of the game”.

The £30m signing never did truly embed himself into Mourinho’s first team at United, although since the departure of the Portuguese boss, his form has seen a massive upturn and he’s now a regular starter for Ole Gunnar Solskjaer.

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3. Eden Hazard

Eden Hazard had a love/hate relationship with Mourinho during his time at Chelsea

Eden Hazard’s Chelsea career will be remembered fondly by all fans of the Blues, but even the Belgian wizard found himself being heavily criticised by Mourinho during the 2013-14 season. To defend the Portuguese, in this instance he was only responding to some apparent criticism of his tactics from Hazard following the Blues’ Champions League loss to Atletico Madrid.

The Belgian hit out after Chelsea’s 1-3 second leg loss, claiming that the Blues would be better off operating as a counter-attacking unit, and naturally, Mourinho couldn’t let it lie. He claimed that the criticism from Hazard was hardly a surprise because the Belgian was not the type of player to sacrifice himself 100% for the team and his teammates.

The two went onto bury the hatchet in 2014-15 as Chelsea romped to a Premier League title victory, but then fell out in the 2015-16 season, with Mourinho claiming that he had a different idea to Hazard of what made an effective ‘number 10’, basically suggesting that the Belgian didn’t do enough work without the ball.

This time Hazard went on to have the last laugh; just weeks after the statement, Mourinho was fired by the Blues for the second time – while Hazard’s career continued to rise at Stamford Bridge, winning another Premier League title and ending with a mega-money move to Real Madrid in the summer of 2019.