Wednesday day night was a tough one for Manchester United fans.
Facing Rochdale in the Carabao Cup with a heavily altered side to the eleven that faced West Ham at the weekend, the Old Trafford club struggled to find the back of the net yet again, unable to take their chances in a game they dominated.
In the end, they overcame their League One opponents thanks to a penalty shootout, but the fixture did nothing to alleviate the growing pressure on Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s shoulders, who knows things need to get better, and they need to do so quickly.
Despite a very positive start as interim manager, the Norwegian has faced more and more difficulties since taking the job permanently, and few have been as critical as the club’s former manager, José Mourinho, who recently stated he hadn’t seen any ‘any improvements’ this season after the 2-0 loss to West Ham compared to what he was giving the fans a year ago.
Everyone is entitled to their opinion, as Solskjaer pointed out in his reply, and one man who also voiced his was former Manchester United CEO Peter Kenyon, who was talking at the Football World Summit in Madrid and was asked if the Portuguese tactician was ‘outdated’.
He said, relayed by El País: “If you put me in charge of a great club and you needed to appoint a manager, my first thought would be José Mourinho. He’s intelligent, he’s relevant and has vast experience. He isn’t outdated. I just think he needs the right club. I’m sure that you’ll see Mourinho be a part of a great club again.
“The key is give him the adequate structure and organisation to make sure he’s a part of everything. I was the first to express my disappointment when he left United because I think he could have been a part of that great leadership structure. No one better than him know what United represents. José is far from being an irrelevant and outdated manager.”
There is still a part of the Old Trafford faithful who believe the Portuguese manager should never have been sacked, and it seems Kenyon would side with that group.
