• Manager says injury lay-off for Zlatan Ibrahimovic would be ‘disaster’
• Ander Herrera says United are becoming a very difficult side to beat
The EFL Cup
is the least valued of the three domestic competitions but, as with
Chelsea in the 2004-05 season, winning it may go some way to convincing
Mourinho’s squad that the first championship of the post-Sir Alex
Ferguson era is possible under him.
“When you have a taste of good things, you want to repeat it,” the
Portuguese said. “When you get used to winning, when you don’t win, you
miss it. You don’t accept not winning and you are always chasing for
more success, so I think it’s a good thing for the players if we manage
to win another trophy.
“We all know the history of this club, that football is changing,
that it’s much harder than it was before, but last season was a very
difficult season for the club and players, but together with their
manager [Louis van Gaal], they managed to win a trophy [the FA Cup]. It was a good taste for them, so we have to try.”
Ander Herrera, who was an unused substitute at Wembley against
Crystal Palace, concurs with his manager. “We want to win every trophy
because we want to respect our history and our fans,” the midfielder
said. “This club is about titles, we don’t select which competitions we
go for, we go into all of them to try to win. We know it is not easy but
we try.”
United’s holy grail is being crowned champions again. Twenty of
United’s 44 major honours have been titles but barring a miracle it will
not occur this season, of course. United are 12 points behind Chelsea
with only 13 matches remaining. But the longer the season goes on the
more Mourinho is transforming United into the relentless proposition all
his finest sides have been.
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A
major factor in this is the belief any contest can be pulled out of the
fire. On Sunday United conceded first at Blackburn Rovers, then calmly
went about winning the FA Cup fifth round tie
2-1. “Everyone who watches our games realises very quickly that a big
team is playing because we control all the games or most of them,”
Herrera said. “When Blackburn scored, we didn’t go crazy, we kept
playing, moving the ball from side to side, creating chances. We have a
lot of confidence in ourselves and we are showing just how difficult it
is to beat us. I cannot say it is impossible to beat us but it is
difficult because we are very compact, we all attack, we create
chances.”
Chelsea’s defeat of Liverpool in the 2005 League Cup
final provided a vital shot in the arm for Mourinho’s Stamford Bridge
project: a trophy glut ensued as his side won consecutive Premier League
titles, the FA Cup and a second League Cup in his three full seasons.
One gauge of where United are under Mourinho is found in the league
performance so far. The 48 points accumulated after 25 matches is his
lowest in English football. It compares poorly to the opening seasons of
his two tenures in west London. At the 25-game mark in 2004-05 Chelsea
had 64 points. In 2013-14 the count was 56.
Yet a glass half-full reading of this is that guiding United to
Sunday’s final is a particular positive given the relative weakness of
the side he inherited compared with those at Chelsea.
In the summer of 2004 Claudio Ranieri’s side had just finished second
and reached the European Cup semi-finals, while in 2013 the team Rafael
Benítez left to Mourinho were third.
Last year United finished fifth with a squad that still required a
sizeable rebuild due to a lack of quality and depth in central defence,
midfield and attack. In his first close season Mourinho addressed this
by buying Eric Bailly, Paul Pogba, Henrikh Mkhitaryan and Zlatan
Ibrahimovic before integrating all of them into the side. This has taken
time and the squad is not yet as strong as he wishes it to be, with
another striker and a left-back, at least, due to be targeted in the
summer.
Mourinho does, though, have what each of his three champion Chelsea
sides possessed: a talismanic centre-forward. In the 2004-05 and 2005-06
vintages this was Didier Drogba; in the 14-15 team it was Diego Costa.
For United this is Ibrahimovic, with Mourinho saying any serious layoff
for the 24-goal man would be a “disaster”.
Herrera also underlined how vital the Swede can be against Southampton
and to United going forward. “He is the target for us. He has great
height, he holds the ball up and he has the fantasy to resolve the play
like he did. It was fantastic to get him because sometimes the opponents
are scared of him and the rest of us take advantage of that. We get
more space, more second ball. We have one of the best in the world. We
are so lucky because we have him and hopefully we can enjoy him for a
long time.”
On Sunday Mourinho has the chance to achieve what none of his
predecessors have in United’s 139-year history: claim a major honour in
his first season as manager. But it is what it can do for the long-term
success of the club that is more significant: deepen the belief of his
players and help propel United on to being champions of England again,
and challenging seriously for a fourth European Cup.
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