“If Paul one day decides to be a manager, I wish that he can be 25 per cent as successful as myself,” he said of Paul Scholes earlier this year, after the ex-United midfielder had raised concerns over Paul Pogba’s form in a red shirt.
Even when asked about his joy at winning the Manchester derby in April, Mourinho was setting it against the backdrop of his previous record: "Probably because I won eight championships I was not over the moon with the victory because that doesn’t make me feel super happy.”
Mourinho is clearly a proud man, and it is when he feels most under pressure that he is quick to remind people of his pedigree in the game. A man with 25 trophies to his name arguably has every right to use them as evidence that he knows what he is doing.
However, Manchester United is a club which lives in the here and now, and one which prides itself on the entertainment it offers its fans. Even prior to the unparalleled successes of Sir Alex Ferguson’s 26 years at the club, Old Trafford was a place synonymous with captivating football.
The likes of George Best, Bobby Charlton, Bryan Robson, Norman Whiteside and Lou Macari had left indelible marks on great Old Trafford performances long before Sir Alex rocked up, and it was around such attractive, attacking football that the great Scot insisted on basing his sides throughout his incredible reign.
Mourinho, on the other hand, was always going to try to do things differently.
Everybody knew that Ed Woodward’s decision to bring in the Portuguese was a conservative measure at a time when United desperately needed to get back to playing Champions League football every season.
Sir Bobby Charlton was an outspoken opponent of the appointment long before it even came about.
“A United manager wouldn’t do that,” Charlton said of Mourinho’s infamous eye-gouge on the late Tito Vilanova in 2011. “Mourinho is a really good coach but that’s as far as I would go really.”
But having brought in the former Chelsea, Inter and Real Madrid boss, there was a clear desire that he replicate some of those past achievements – with eight league titles and two Champions League crowns among his honours.
So far, though, there has been no sign of that level of success and United’s 2018-19 season has begun with backbiting, conjecture and misery off the field along with disappointment on it.
While he has attempted to employ some of the same tactics that he used in previous jobs, it just hasn’t washed at Manchester United.
This is not a club at which fans will sit and watch turgid, introspective football forever in the vague hope that a trophy will follow. They want to be entertained because that is what they have come to expect.
And the manager’s behaviour is not in keeping with United’s traditions either. Rather than nurturing youth talents, he has stunted the growth of some and used others as punching bags.
Even looking beyond the whole Luke Shaw saga of the last two years, the way he cast aside the seven young additions to his squad for the US tour and moaned about the fact he didn’t have “my squad” available was unbecoming of a person in his position.
He has also pilloried Pogba when given the opportunity to praise him post-World Cup, undermined his superiors by revealing plans for signings that have subsequently failed to arrive, taken every opportunity to blast Manchester City for having the temerity to win games of football and entertain their supporters, and has generally gone about making enemies left, right and centre.
Consequently, Mourinho now finds himself isolated.
Ian Wright has compared the current climate at Old Trafford to "the last days of Arsene Wenger", arguing that, just like the former Arsenal boss, the two-time Champions League winner risks tarnishing everything he's done, while Paul Ince believes United have become a "laughing stock" .
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