5 things Mourinho has failed at since becoming Manchester United manager

#4 A failure to rid United of its plethora of average players

Young is symptomatic of the dross at United

One of the most enduring images of Mourinho’s time at Old Trafford has been the sight of Antonio Valencia and Ashley Young being the starting fullbacks for a team like Manchester United.

While these two men are fine professionals, they are in their 30s and to make it worse, are wingers who have been converted into fullbacks.

The Manchester United playing squad is to put it mildly, filled with middling to below average players who have no business playing in a team with Premier League and UEFA Champions League aspirations.

For reasons that are difficult to understand, there has been a reluctance to rid the team and populate the team with quality as Guardiola did at Manchester City.

Lingard, Rashford, Jones, Smalling, Young, Marouane Fellaini, Matteo Darmian are players who should be playing for mid-level clubs in various top leagues. These players have been given opportunities to show what they are capable of and have failed to impress.

While it is true that every title-winning team needs squad players who can contribute from time to time, when a top-level team has the number of average players that United has, it becomes almost impossible for the better players to perform consistently.