Manchester United are moving towards becoming the team of Paul Pogba says manager Jose Mourinho. Meanwhile the midfielder himself says that the team has not given up their Premier League title dreams, and remain focused on trying to catch Manchester City. United cruised past Stoke City 3-0 at Old Trafford tonight, closing the gap between themselves and the top of the Premier League to 12 points, with 15 games left to play.
Pogba assisted on the Antonio Valencia and Anthony Martial goals Monday night, to give him nine through 13 league games.
Mourinho says the team is changing shape to suit the flamboyant Frenchman’s knowledge, skills and abilities. United are getting closer to becoming the team of Paul Pogba.
“He was moving the ball fantastically well, with long passes changing the direction and creating problems for the opponent,” Mourinho said.
“He had an assist and if he had scored the free-kick with the last shot of the game, it would be really a reward for him. I think he is happy with the way the team is playing and he’s happy because the team is changing the profile and the profile is going more in his direction.”
In a postgame interview with Sky Sports, Pogba was asked if Manchester City’s 4-3 loss at Liverpool on Sunday gave United a boost.
“Obviously we see Manchester City in front of us and they lost,” he responded. “They are first so we always want to catch them, so it was good that they lost, so for us we have to think about ourselves.
“It’s good that they lose points but we have to go back to winning because we want to catch them again. We’re not looking to the past. We’re just looking to the future and the next games.”
“We just want to catch City. We just have to focus on ourselves, keep winning and I think we will be OK.”
No doubt United will be given a major boost in the title chase if they can acquire Alexis Sanchez from Arsenal. Here’s a link to the latest on that as Man City have dropped out of the race to acquire the Chilean while Chelsea are now in.
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net and TheBank.News, which is partnered with News Now. Banks, a former writer for the Washington Times, NBC Chicago.com and Chicago Tribune.com, currently contributes regularly to WGN CLTV and the Tribune company’s blogging community Chicago Now.
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