Patrick Rees
After the Derby day defeat to Manchester City, the manager, Jose Mourinho, will be looking to have a fresh start in the Europa League campaign. The side will be facing the Eredivisie outfit Feyenoord in Rotterdam on Thursday night.
The manager recently made it clear that the 18-year-old Marcus Rashford will be starting the game and the Devils underwent their final preparation at the Aon Training Complex on Wednesday.
“The next big game is against Feyenoord and he is going to play,” Mourinho said. “I trust him completely. I know his future will be absolutely brilliant.
“He is mainly a No 9 and if you want to play him in different positions, we need to work him, we need to improve him, but his big personality is there.”
Manchester United, quite surprisingly, started their game (against City) with Mkhitaryan and Lingard and the duo failed miserably to deliver the promises and eventually, the manager snubbed them off to bring Marcus Rashford and Ander Herrera.
And now, Henrikh Mkhitaryan and Phil Jones have missed training ahead of their clash. The pair were the only absences from Jose Mourinho’s outfield squad which trained at Carrington on Wednesday morning ahead of an afternoon flight to the Netherlands.
Mourinho indicated at the weekend Mkhitaryan would not start in Rotterdam, regardless of his fitness.
“The performances are the ones that are the deciding factor,” Mourinho said when asked if certain individuals should fear for their places. “How can I decide bad performances? Bad performances is the only way that I can decide. So if you are asking me ‘are they going to play against Feyenoord?’ No. No.
“And is it to punish? No, it’s not to punish, it is just to decide in relation to what I have, and what do I have with their performances. So, of course, I’m going to play other players.”
Jones has not been named in any of Mourinho’s five matchday squads and his brittleness continues to be a problem in his sixth season at the club.
Full United training squad:
De Gea
Romero
Valencia
Fosu-Mensah
Darmian
Smalling
Blind
Bailly
Rojo
Shaw
Schneiderlin
Herrera
Fellaini
Pogba
Carrick
Lingard
Mata
Young
Memphis
Martial
Ibrahimovic
Rashford
Rooney
