Manchester United cannot waste too much time on their defeat at the hands of Tottenham Hotspur with a huge Premier League game against high-flying Bournemouth coming up on Sunday.
The Cherries are sixth in the Premier League table and are unbeaten in their last four games. Ruben Amorim must start demanding consistency from his players if the team is to climb up the table with the Red Devils six points off the top four.
Ahead of the game, the head coach was asked about the injury situation at the club and he revealed that Mason Mount, who went off injured against Manchester City, is set to miss the festive period.
“Several weeks,” he said at the pre-match press conference. “I don’t know the exact date, but it’s going to be for long. And that’s it, it’s part of football and you continue.”
Mount out long-term
Victor Lindelof was another who limped out of the Carabao Cup clash on Thursday and Amorim was asked about injuries in general and the way to fix it.
He rued the lack of time available for training, which is playing its part in injuries. And he promised that he will help Mount rediscover his best form.
“That is not my department. What I can do, is to help Mase, to teach him how to play our game when he’s recovering, try to use that that time for him to think in the different things.
“Then I think it’s the worst part is that we don’t have time to train like we should do, when you are recovering from a lot of injuries. So, we are always travelling. We have we have games, training, we don’t have the team, all the team together and this is really hard to recreate the game, before they come to the game.
“And you can see with Vic [Lindelof]. Vic was recovering; they trained really well, we push him, we make all the sprints that he should do before to come to a game. But the game is a completely different world, so they have to have more time to train. So, it’s really hard.
“We try to manage that with rotation, but even with rotation, it is really hard to have all the squad. So, with Mason Mount, we are going to help him, it’s really hard for the player to be out for so long and he’s trying really hard, the same as Antony. If they try really hard, we will help them until the end.”
Marcus Rashford was once again dropped for the Spurs game after he missed the derby. Amorim was asked about his availability and the head coach refused to give a straight answer but refuted claims that the decision was based on a disciplinary issue.
Rashy issue
“Yes. Of course (is Marcus available for Sunday). No, no, it’s the same thing, guys. It’s the same thing. It will be the same thing.”
The Mancunian has already revealed that he would like to leave his boyhood club and the Portuguese might keep dropping him if his motivation levels are not where they ought to be at.
Lastly, the former Sporting Lisbon boss was asked about Antony’s poor showing and the coach pointed to a lack of confidence for the below-par showings.
“He needs more confidence. If you remember Antony and I played against him in Ajax. He lacks a little bit of confidence to go to one against one so he will improve. But he’s working really hard and he’s trying in displaying more inside than outside, especially in this game. And he just has to do that, to work really hard and I will happily help him to be a better player.”
Feature image Shaun Botterill via Getty Images
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Ayantan Chowdhury
Ayantan has worked for 10 years in the Indian sports media industry, writing for the biggest newspapers and websites but his heart was always set on writing about his favourite club. Currently an editor at The Peoples Person. You can follow him on X: @ayantanc_25
