Here’s How Manchester United Can Manage Manchester City Without The The Phenomenal Paul Pogba
The 3-1 victory against Arsenal over the weekend ended on a bittersweet note for Manchester United as Paul Pogba picked up a red card. More than anything else, it is the timing that is extremely unfortunate, considering the Red Devils have to play Manchester City next in the Premier League.
During the time when the Frenchman was injured this season, the Red Devils seemed a lot more haphazard in the middle of the park and dropped a considerable amount of points. Once Pogba returned though, things seem to have returned to normalcy and the game against the Gunners was truly spectacular to watch.
However, United will have to do without Pogba against Pep Guardiola’s high-flying Man City and that could prove to be a major hurdle for Jose Mourinho. He has relied a lot on the midfielder for some creative dynamism up front and the club will need it the most against City. But now the Red Devils will have to do with what they have – and that in itself will prove to be quite a cumbersome task.
Although Mourinho broke out of his shell and played beautiful attacking football against Arsene Wenger’s men, he might resort to parking the bus once more when they host City. In Pogba, United have a player who can break from box-to-box and no other player in the squad can execute that role with as much finesse.
Hence, the game does get compromised to an extent but the Red Devils cannot afford mistakes like that against City. In fact, to make matters worse, Mourinho might also have to do without the services of Marouane Fellaini. Nothing has been confirmed yet but it is a possibility and if that happens, that will stretch United’s options further.
Mourinho could play Jesse Lingard since the youngster has done decently of late. However, his vision is not as refined as Pogba’s. Moreover, this conundrum could also fuel Romelu Lukaku’s ongoing slump in form. Here is a worrying statistic – the Belgian now has only one goal from his last 12 games for the club and his form at the Emirates was not encouraging enough.
Hence, without Pogba, Mourinho might have to resort to his deeply-defensive brand of football once more to try his best and extract a point out of the game. That may not be such a bad thing considering the present situation but it seems unlikely that the Red Devils would be the team to bring an end to City’s rampant domination this season.