Jose Mourinho tight-lipped on Man Utd defender Chris Smalling
Friday 18 November 2016 15:16, UK
Manchester United boss Jose Mourinho dismissed questions about Chris Smalling ahead of Saturday's clash with Arsenal but confirmed Luke Shaw will be back in the team soon.
Mourinho appeared to criticise centre-back Smalling and left-back Shaw after they missed United's 3-1 win at Swansea City, suggesting they had shown a lack of bravery.
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It subsequently emerged that Smalling had a broken toe, but Mourinho refused to confirm the injury at Friday's press conference, and brushed off questions about the England man .
"Chris Smalling you cannot ask," Mourinho said. "You cannot ask because you have your sources, you trust your sources, you believe in your sources.
"You write what your sources tell you and you did that for 15 days, so now you are not going to ask me to comment on your sources' information, so I don't say a word about Chris Smalling.
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"You have your trustful relationship with your sources and you wrote, you spoke, you criticise, so that's fine for me.
"You do the big headlines with your sources and now I am not interested in commenting on that."
Mourinho was more forthcoming on Shaw, who has been troubled by niggling injuries since returning at the start of the season from a double leg break.
"Luke Shaw I comment, yes," he said. "He worked well in this period where we had a very small group, which is not the best, but he worked really well.
"He is ready to play. I don't have any problem with him. I am not saying he plays or he doesn't play tomorrow.
"I am saying that he is my player, a young player with potential. A young player like every young player with little problems, with things he needs to learn, things he needs to improve.
"But he is a player of my confidence and playing now five matches in two weeks like we are going to do, in three different competitions, for sure he is going to play."
