Brighton 3 Man Utd 2
Jose Mourinho blamed a series of mistakes from his side for their 3-2 defeat Brighton on Sunday. The Seagulls soared into a 3-1 half-time lead thanks to goals from Glenn Murray, Shane Duffy and Pascal Gross, while Romelu Lukaku scored for the visitors from Luke Shaw’s cross.
United, who were off the pace from the first minute, improved slightly after the interval but their second goal came five minutes into stoppage time when Paul Pogba scored from the penalty spot after Duffy had fouled Marouane Fellaini.
Punished for our mistakes
It was too little too late for United and the pressure is already rising on Mourinho after a torrid pre-season preparation when he was described as going into “meltdown” on the club’s tour to the States.
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Asked by BBC Sport for his analysis on the defeat, Mourinho replied: “We were punished by the mistakes we made. For me that’s the story of the game. We made incredible mistakes in some crucial moments. Mistakes that killed us.”
Singling out the sloppy defending that led to the third goal, Mourinho said he had seen no sign of a drop in intensity during training last week. “The week leading up was good and I expected the team collectively to be better,” he said. “There are basic mistakes that makes almost an impossible mission to win the match.”
Nonetheless, Mourinho refused to pick out any of his players for specific criticism. “I don’t want to go in that direction,” he said. “Last season when I was critical of my team and was debating openly the performances I was criticised for being too open about my players. I will be open when they are doing well. I cannot criticise the desire of my players.”
Seagulls had more hunger
United captain Paul Pogba was blunt in his assessment of his side’s performance, admitting that Brighton “had more hunger than us”. The World Cup winner said he was as guilty as any United player and they got the result that the efforts merited. “I put myself first, that my attitude wasn’t right enough. We made mistakes we shouldn’t make. We tried to push and push, we kept trying, but it was a bit too late.”
Mourinho takes a swipe at City
Mourinho’s mood won’t have been helped by events earlier in the day at the Etihad where Manchester City thrashed Huddersfield Town 6-1. The United manager had taken a swipe at his neighbours going into the weekend fixtures when he was asked about about City’s £10m Amazon Prime documentary All Or Nothing.
The behind-the-scenes programme about City’s title win was released earlier this week and it sounds like Mourinho won’t be settling in front of his TV anytime soon. “I haven’t seen it but I know a few things about the movie,” he [1] said. “My reaction is if you are a rich club you can buy top players, you cannot buy class.”
It was an odd comment coming from the manager of the wealthiest club in the world, but City will brush off the jibe as easily as they brushed aside Huddersfield.
Guardiola agrees with Jose
Sergio Aguero stole the show with a hat-trick - his ninth in the Premier League to leave him two shy of Alan Shearer’s record - and there were also contributions from Gabriel Jesus, David Silva and an own goal from Terence Kongolo. “He is in an incredible condition with the ball and without the ball,” said Guardiola when asked about Aguero. “I never saw him like this since I was here.”
As for Mourinho’s comments, Guardiola refrained from kicking a man when he was down. “That is true, you cannot buy class,” he said. “I agree with Jose.”
