Players and staff were openly discussing the prospect of Mourinho
losing his job as they made the journey back by train to Manchester on
Saturday afternoon Speaking on BT Sport, former United defender Rio
Ferdinand said: ‘I think there are some big decisions to be made at
Manchester United now.
‘I think the hierarchy and the people who run the club, people like
Ed Woodward, are having conversations at that level as to where they go
from here. ‘At the moment there doesn’t seem to be that togetherness in
the changing room. Decisions on the manager, the squad, how they are
going to take this club forward.
There has to be improvements.’ Mourinho was already reeling from a
week in which his side were dumped out at the third-round stage of the
Carabao Cup by Championship side Derby and another public clash with
Paul Pogba in training. Other players such as Marcus Rashford have also
felt the manager’s ire as Mourinho struggles to get his group to respond
and divisions within it grow.
Speaking at half-time, old boy Paul Scholes said: ‘It’s probably as
bad as you’ll see from a United team for quite some time. ‘We spoke
about attitude before the game. It’s been questioned over the last four
weeks and today it has to be questioned again. ‘The hunger and desire to
get against people just wasn’t there.
