The difficulty in assessing Mourinho and his job at Manchester United in Year 1

Jose Mourinho inherited an unbalanced, high-priced squad at Manchester United; how much has it really improved under his watch? He won't be able to be fully judged until after his second season.

Jonathan Wilson | Apr 14, 2017

The difficulty in assessing Mourinho and his job at Manchester United in Year 1 /

Perhaps it’s not fair to make definitive judgments just yet. After all, since he first took over a club with a realistic chance of winning a league title, Porto in 2002, it’s been on his second season that Jose Mourinho has always won the league. It’s true that he also won it in his first at Porto, Chelsea (the first time around) and Inter Milan, but given the demoralized and unbalanced squad he inherited at Manchester United, it would be unfair to expect too much just yet.

It would, given the competitive nature of the modern Premier League, be equally unfair to dismiss him as a failure if United doesn’t win the league next season. When there are six serious contenders, it doesn’t necessarily follow that there is one champion and five failures. Yet still, it’s fair to ask whether there have been serious signs of improvement this season, particularly given a net outlay of $150 million this season, including the world-record signing of Paul Pogba.

After 30 games of this season, United has 57 points. Assuming it keeps picking up points at the same rate (which, with Chelsea, Manchester City, Arsenal and Tottenham still to play may be tricky), that puts the club on course for 72 points. That would be six points more than it got last season but only two more than it got the year before that, in its first season under Louis van Gaal. The season before that, under David Moyes (and, briefly, Ryan Giggs), it got only 64 points. So United is (just about) on course for their best season in the league since Sir Alex Ferguson left the club. The question, though, is whether that is enough.

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On the plus side, there’s been an unbeaten run of 21 games in the league, but even that has a negative, as 10 of those games have been drawn. There have been 15 previous instances of sides going 20 or more games unbeaten in the Premier League; none of the previous unbeaten sides have picked up fewer points per game.

There was victory in the League Cup, which perhaps relieves some pressure, but the club's FA Cup defense ended limply with defeat to Chelsea in the quarterfinal, Mourinho’s plans to stifle his former side undone when Ander Herrera was sent off after collecting a second booking for yet another foul on Eden Hazard.

Winning the Europa League remains a possibility–the club drew 1-1 at Anderlecht in the first leg of the quarterfinals–and it is that competition, once so scorned by Mourinho, that perhaps offers United’s most plausible route into the Champions League next season. Even if it does end up finishing fifth or sixth in league play, this season could hardly be termed a failure if it finished up with two trophies.

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But there are other issues beyond the numbers about which to be concerned.

There has been little fluency about United this season. Even during the long unbeaten run, it could rarely have been called thrilling. Perhaps it does get the ball forward more this season than it did under Van Gaal, but that’s a low bar to clear. There has been a baffling dependence on Zlatan Ibrahimovic, whose 28 goals in all competitions would be more unambiguously impressive if they weren’t accompanied always by the thought that he is 35 and that a club of United’s stature probably shouldn’t be so reliant on somebody so far into the autumn of his career.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic throughout his storied career

Instead of going up for a bicycle kick, Zlatan Ibrahimovic rides bikes during a July 2001 photoshoot in Amsterdam upon signing for Ajax from hometown Swedish club Malmo.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic clashes with Rio Ferdinand in Sweden's friendly vs. England at Old Trafford in Manchester, England on November 10, 2001.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic scores for Ajax during a Dutch Eredivisie match between Willem II and Ajax in the Koning Willem II Stadium on February 2, 2003.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic in his early days playing for Ajax in the Dutch Eredivisie.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic celebrates one of his goals for Ajax on October 3, 2003.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic celebrates his goal against England in a friendly in Gothenburg, Sweden, on March 31, 2004.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic takes on questions at a press conference during Euro 2004 in Portugal.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic removes his helmet after a go-cart race in Gimo, Sweden, on May 26, 2004, prior to Euro 2004 in Portugal.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic scores a famous goal for Sweden, a flying back-heel vs. Italy in Euro 2004 in Porto, Portugal.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic celebrates during a 4-0 rout of Empoli in a September 11, 2005, match in Serie A.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic celebrates at the end of the last Serie A match of the season between Juventus and Cagliari on May 29, 2005. Despite Ibrahimovic was enjoying the club's league title, it was later stripped because of the club's place in a massive match-fixing scandal that rocked Italian soccer.

Patrick Vieira and Zlatan Ibrahimovic stop Lazio's Igli Tare during a Serie A match on April 22, 2006.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic kicks Germany's Christoph Metzelder in the head while going for the ball in the 2006 World Cup's round of 16 in Munich on June 24, 2006.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic and his Swedish teammates celebrate qualifying for Euro 2008 after a match vs. Latvia in Stockholm, Sweden, on November 21, 2007.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic inaugurates 'Zlatan Court,' the newly renovated gravel pitch where he used to play in the Rosengard neighborhood of Malmo, Sweden, in October 2007.

Inter Milan's Zlatan Ibrahimovic signs an autograph in front of a hotel in Moscow on October 22, 2007, on the eve of their UEFA Champions league qualifying football match against CSKA Moscow.

Marco Materazzi, Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Dejan Stankovic celebrate Inter Milan's victory over rival AC Milan at Milan's San Siro on October 28, 2006.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic leaps onto Inter Milan teammate Adriano after a goal against Fiorentina on January 21, 2007.

Valencia's Santiago Canizares of Valencia squares up to Inter Milan's Zlatan Ibrahimovic during the second leg of the UEFA Champions League last sixteen on March 6, 2007, at the Mestalla Stadium in Valencia, Spain.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic is mobbed by fans on at Parma's Tardini Stadium after Inter Milan captured the Serie A title on May 18, 2008.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic challenges Liverpool captain Steven Gerrard during a Champions League knockout match on March 11, 2008, at the San Siro.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic celebrates after scoring for Sweden against Greece in Euro 2008 in Salzburg, Austria.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic shows off his athleticism while training at the Rose Bowl in Los Angeles on the eve of a friendly against Chelsea on July 20, 2009.

Lionel Messi is congratulated by Zlatan Ibrahimovic after scoring during a UEFA Champions League match between Barcelona and Dynamo Kiev at Camp Nou on September 29, 2009.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Lionel Messi mimic each other in training at Ciutat Esportiva Joan Gamper on November 27, 2009, two days before a Clasico against Real Madrid.

Star Barcelona teammates Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Thierry Henry laugh during a training session at UCLA in Los Angeles on July 30, 2009.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic celebrates after scoring against former club Inter Milan on May 6, 2012 at the San Siro in Milan.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic celebrates after scoring the opening goal during a Serie A match between AC Milan and ACF Fiorentina on April 7, 2012 in Milan.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic hits a bicycle kick for AC Milan against Bologna FC at Stadio Giuseppe Meazza in Serie A action on April 22, 2012.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic is honored with his name at the Walk of Fame of Sports at the Stadium Square in his home town of Malmo in southern Sweden, on September 9, 2012.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic celebrates after scoring a famous goal for Sweden vs. England in a friendly in Stockholm, Sweden, on November 14, 2012.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic celebrates PSG teammate David Beckham after scoring during a Ligue 1 match against Brest on May 18, 2013 at Parc des Princes stadium in Paris.

Geoffroy Van der Hasselt/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images

PSG's Zlatan Ibrahimovic holds the Ligue 1 trophy on the podium at the Parc des Princes stadium in Paris, France, on May 14, 2016.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic leaves the pitch with his sons Maximilian and Vincent (wearing jerseys with 'King' and 'Legend' written in the back) after scoring his second goal vs. Nantes and setting the Ligue 1 record for goals in one season on May 14, 2016 in Paris, France.

PSG's Zlatan Ibrahimovic shares a light moment with Eurosport's Olivier Dacourt before a post-match interview on May 21, 2016.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic and his Manchester United manager Jose Mourinho stand prior to kickoff of the Community Shield match between Leicester City and Manchester United at Wembley Stadium on August 7, 2016, in London.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic celebrates as he scores for Manchester United in the 2016 EFL Cup final against Southampton at Wembley Stadium on February 26, 2017 in London.

He’s not even the only 35-year-old it depends upon. United is a far better side with Michael Carrick holding at the back of midfield. This season with him in the team it’s won 67% of games and lost 4%; without him it’s won 56% and lost 22%. Pogba, having been brought in for that record fee, has yet to convince, with the suspicion that he is at his best in a 4-3-3 while Mourinho continues to deploy a 4-2-3-1.

Then there have been some baffling aspects of man-management. While it could be argued that Mourinho has successful defused the Wayne Rooney issue, giving him sufficient opportunities to prove he is no longer effective at the highest level of the game, there are other issues. Why did it take so long for Henrikh Mkhitaryan to be brought into the side? Was it really necessary to ostracize Bastian Schweinsteiger? And is the constant criticism of Luke Shaw really the best way to get a player recovering from serious injury back to his best–or does it risk provoking the rest of the squad, as his treatment of Raul reportedly did at Real Madrid? That all feeds into the broader concern that Mourinho struggles to connect with this generation of players.

United, certainly in the longer term, would expect more. But what is true is that United is more solid, more dogged than it was before. It has a fight and a scrappiness it didn’t have under either Moyes or Van Gaal. In itself, that is probably not enough, but it may be a necessary stage on the path to true success. And that can only really be judged in a second season.

Published Apr 14, 2017

JONATHAN WILSON

An accomplished author of multiple books, Jonathan Wilson is one of the world’s preeminent minds on soccer tactics and history.