Mourinho bashing must stop - Man Utd's youth clearout is brutal but necessary

The United boss has thus far given no Premier League minutes to Marcus Rashford while he's allowed other prospects to leave but there could be a positive outcome in the long-term

For some, this has been a concerning week so far for Manchester United. The optimism and overwhelming joy pouring from Old Trafford on Friday as Paul Pogba and Zlatan Ibrahimovic starred against Southampton has been curbed somewhat by events which have followed in the transfer market and within the youth ranks.

The decision by Jose Mourinho not to introduce Marcus Rashford from the bench for a second successive game already had some Reds raising their eyebrows, and the subsequent sale of Tyler Blackett to Reading and Cameron Borthwick-Jackson’s loan move to Wolves have further concerned those who consider United’s youth development as central to the club’s future.

Monday’s under-23 loss to Southampton at St Mary’s caused more ire, with many asking why the likes of Andreas Pereira, Memphis Depay, Rashford and Will Keane were not included. Players who are not getting first-team minutes right now are getting no minutes at all, it seems.

For Rashford in particular the lack of game time is set to have almost immediate consequences, with England manager Sam Allardyce admitting he can see no justification to call upon last season’s breakout star despite his positive experience at Euro 2016.

“Rashford is not playing now so it makes it harder for me to select him, as exciting as he was last year and how he burst on the scene,” Allardyce said this week.

“At such a young age, do I say, ‘Go and play in the under-21s, get used to international football there, play regularly there and it will help you eventually, hopefully to break into the Manchester United team and then break into the England senior team’? You've got all those scenarios to consider.”

It all comes after a summer during which Mourinho was forced to defend his record with young players. Following on from Louis van Gaal, who gave over 100 appearances last season to academy products, there were demands for the Portuguese to make the most of the youngsters who had provided the bright spots of the Dutchman’s otherwise-underwhelming reign. A £160 million spending spree later, there is little sign of those home-grown talents.

But the exits of Blackett and Borthwick-Jackson, added to the loans of Guillermo Varela, Adnan Januzaj and James Wilson and permanent departures of Paddy McNair and Donald Love, leave United with only a handful of young stars to turn to this season. Other than Jesse Lingard and Rashford, only Timothy Fosu-Mensah, Pereira, Keane, Joe Riley, Regan Poole and James Weir remain at the club of those who featured at one stage or another last term, and some of them are expected to be offloaded temporarily before the transfer window closes.

Those immediately levelling criticism at Mourinho’s model need to consider the fact that Van Gaal also offloaded a huge number of former academy products. What’s more, he loaned out Januzaj and Blackett himself, handed a minimal amount of games to Pereira, and only called upon Rashford when he had no other option. While the 65-year-old could rightly boast about his decision to give Lingard the chance to express himself at first-team level, the successes of Borthwick-Jackson and Rashford were altogether more accidental.

Borthwick-Jackson will gain more from spending time at Wolves this season than from sitting and waiting for Luke Shaw to lose form. Pereira will be better served heading to a Fulham than spending another campaign tallying League Cup starts and little else. The sight of some of United’s greatest young hopes in other clubs’ jerseys may have people worrying about what the future holds, but they still have a big part to play so long as they can prove to Mourinho that they are ready.

“Mourinho has told me I’ve got a future there, he sees a future for me,” Borthwick-Jackson explained after completing his Wolves loan move. “So that’s what I’m looking to do, gain experience and then start [at United].”

For those still at Old Trafford, such as Rashford and Memphis, they have to trust the manager when he says their chance will come in September when the League Cup and Europa League start to bulk up the calendar. And in the meantime, they must make the most of getting to train every day with some of the world’s best players.

And for Borthwick-Jackson, Januzaj et al there is the knowledge that Mourinho has far from washed his hands of them. McNair, Blackett and Love are no longer Manchester United players but the club is not willing to repeat the mistake made with Paul Pogba when it comes to players they still believe have a part to play.

The bottom line at the moment is that United have made a bid to arrest their first-team slide in welcoming Mourinho and adding the likes of Pogba and Ibrahimovic. They want to get back to winning ways and quick, but that doesn’t mean they will sacrifice the progress of their future first-teamers.

If they approach their new realities in a professional manner, then the likes of Borthwick-Jackson and Rashford will get their chance again. And when they do so, it will be in a winning Manchester United XI rather than Van Gaal’s underwhelming outfit of last season.