Mourinho Offers Injury Update: Man Utd Have 9 Fitness Doubts For Liverpool Trip

Jose Mourinho offered an insight in to his growing injury list with Manchester United sweating over the fitness of nine players ahead of Sunday’s trip to Liverpool.

Mourinho was criticised for making eight changes to his starting eleven for Man Utd’s disappointing 2-1 defeat to Valencia in their final Champions League group game on Wednesday night.

The defeat in Spain meant United missed out on the chance to pip Juventus to first place in Group H after the Serie A champions slumped to a shock loss to Young Boys in Switzerland but Mourinho insists he was forced in to most of the changes due to a growing injury list.

David De Gea and Nemanja Matic were the only two players rested against Valencia with Luke Shaw, Diogo Dalot, Victor Lindelof and Matteo Darmian all missing the trip to Spain due to knocks.

Alexis Sanchez is still working his way back from a hamstring injury that will keep him out until the New Year, Anthony Martial is also nursing his own hamstring problem while Chris Smalling suffered a foot injury during Man Utd’s 4-1 win over Fulham last weekend.

With Scott McTominay forced to make a late withdrawal from the squad against Valencia due to a knock and Marcos Rojo substituted at half-time having picked up an injury during the opening 45 minutes last night, it means Mourinho is sweating over the fitness of nine players ahead of Sunday’s visit to Liverpool.

During his post-match press conference, Mourinho told ManUtd.com:

“[Chris] Smalling is injured, [Victor] Lindelof is injured. [Matteo] Darmian is injured. [Anthony] Martial is injured. [Diogo] Dalot is injured. The only two players I could bring and I didn’t were De Gea and Matic. You are the first ones to make statements saying how many minutes Matic is playing, saying week-after-week he needs a rest. If he doesn’t have a rest when we’re already qualified, he will play until he explodes! Of course, it’s a normal option to leave him out.

”With David, it’s a question to give a match or not to [Sergio] Romero. Marcelino did the same with [Jaume] Domenech. Romero is such a good goalkeeper I even played him in the Europa League final a couple of years ago. Two chances to say they could play but, apart from that, nobody.

“Last week, we had three matches with the majority of players playing all the time. I had no other options including a player like Rojo, who I expected to play today and give a rest to Young for example. At half-time, Rojo is injured and is out. The players I play in this match, if it was a match to decide the group, would be a very similar team. That’s the reality.”

The likes of Martial, Shaw, Smalling, Dalot and Rojo will all need to be assessed before their availability for the Liverpool game is determined but it remains to be seen how many of United’s casualty list will make the trip to Anfield this weekend.

Mourinho is expected to recall Ashley Young to the defence on Sunday while Jesse Lingard and Marcus Rashford should also come back in to the United attack against Liverpool along with De Gea and Matic so Man Utd should have a stronger eleven on show than the side that faced Valencia last night.