Jose Mourinho’s Manchester United side have looked pretty good in 2o17.

They’ve already reached the League Cup final, they have one foot in the Europa League’s last sixteen and are a win away from an FA Cup quarter-final place.

United are also just two points away from Premier League’s top four, which would see them qualify for next season’s Champions League.

Champions League qualification is a priority for the Red Devils this term but Mourinho and the United faithful love winning silverware.

So that got me thinking would United fans be Ok with their team finishing outside of the top four, if it meant that they’d finish the season with the three trophies in the cabinet?

As Man Utd continue to fight on four fronts, they’ll find themselves in the middle of a heaving fixture list.

We already know that Jose likes winning the League Cup, the Portuguese boss sees it as a springboard to better things as it gets his players in the mood for more silverware! As they’re already in the final, then you cannot imagine that he’ll rest too many for that one.

The United manager has also talked up the FA Cup this week. He believes too many foreign coaches and bigger sides don’t give the competition the credit it’s tradition deserves.

He stated:

“If I lose, I lose because the opponent was better or because we didn’t play well, but I’m not going to throw it away.”

“We try to go serious. I like Wembley, I like the FA Cup, so I have to try to get the second one.”

So while I’d expect some changes in his team to face Blackburn Rovers in the FA Cup this weekend, I seriously doubt he’ll make wholesale changes or flood his team with youngsters like Fergie has done in the past.

Obviously it helps to have a strong squad and that you can bring in World Cup winner Bastian Schweinsteiger, veteran winger Ashley Young and England international striker Marcus Rashford.

I would imagine Jose and his backroom staff will look at United second leg in Europe as the ideal opportunity to rest as many first team regulars as he’d dare. They take a 3-0 lead to France and will already be looking beyond Saint-Etienne.

But the Europa League could actually be the main objective for Man United this season, especially if they slip up in the league. That’s because winning UEFA’s second continental club competition would see United automatically qualify for next season’s Champions League, in essence winning the Europa League is actually better than finishing the Premier League campaign in fourth place!

Jose and his players would love nothing more than getting strong first leg victories in the Europa League as it could give certain players an opportunity to have a game off. But as they get closer to the final, the opposition will get tougher and an away draw in the first leg could also prove problematic.

Winning breeds confidence, so Manchester United certainly won’t take their eye off the league, that would be calamitous but I really do believe that the Man Utd hierarchy, the manager and the fans wouldn’t mind missing out on a top four spot as long as they could win the other three competitions, especially the Europa League.

Then Jose would add a few extra stars to his pool and he’ll have a squad of winners ready to challenge for the major titles next season.

Posted on February 18th, 2017 by scott
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