Jose Mourinho has confirmed that Manchester United are set for a summer clear-out following the world record acquisition of Paul Pogba. The Portuguese boss claims that he is happy with his current team but admitted some players will need to leave either on loan or on permanent transfers to make way for the new signings.
Mourinho has strengthened all the key positions in his squad with the additions of Pogba, Eric Bailly, Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Henrikh Mkhitaryan in a bid to put the club in contention for the Premier League after Louis van Gaal's side ended last season finishing a disappointing fifth. The former Chelsea and Real Madrid boss suggests that the Reds' transfer business is over after Pogba's acquisition. Some members of the current squad will however be shown the exit in order to start the new season with a balanced team.
Bastian Schweinsteiger, Adnan Januzaj, Matteo Darmian, Ashley Young and Memphis Depay, Juan Mata, Daley Blind or Marcos Rojo have been tipped as potential casualties in Mourinho's reshuffle in recent days. The boss refuses to name any of them but did confirm some will leave on loan and others will be sold before the end of the transfer window on 31 May.
"I'm really happy [with my squad]," he told MUTV. "It's the first time I've worked with such a number of players because I'm used to working with 20 plus the keepers, and we have in the squad 23 plus the keepers – and even so we had to make decisions and let some players go on loan, and try to sell others."
Mourinho predicts that some players will be ruled out of his match-day squad in the early part of the season but pointed out that the squad's strength in-depth will help him cope with the busy fixtures, especially once the Europa League and the League Cup starts.
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Schweinsteiger is one of the players expected to leave United before the end of the transfer window
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"But this group of 23 is a great group and I think in this moment – and I told them this – there is a little bit of frustration for the ones that I have not selected. They work hard to be in the match and they aren't, and this is going to happen in the next two or three weeks because we have just one Premier League match.
"But, in September, the League Cup starts, the Europa League starts, we start playing three matches a week and then everybody is involved and the squad is good. The empathy between the guys is really good too, so I'm happy with the squad."
Mourinho has reiterated during the summer transfer window that he wanted to have his squad finalised before the start of the Premier League. This way the manager has thanked the club officials for sealing the Pogba deal just days before their opener against Bournemouth on 14 August.
"I think the club was fantastic," he added. "I couldn't be happier with the way we did our market because we got four players that we really believe in and we thought about the profile – the tactical profile, the physical profile, the personality.
"And we got them all before the start of the Premier League, when the transfer window only closes at the end of the month and it becomes normal – almost a tradition, that people delay and delay and delay. We did it before the end of the month, which I think is tremendous work by my board."
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