Jose Mourinho hits back at media for criticising him calling out his players after Manchester United defeat to Brighton

Manchester United took on Brighton on Sunday afternoon and once again their trip to the seaside ended in disappointment. But how did Jose Mourinho react when being pressured to criticise his players?

Jose Mourinho’s men started brightly. Anthony Martial, who came in for the injured Alexis Sanchez, drove into the box and unleashed a shot, signalling United’s intent.

Manchester United were pressing and hurrying Brighton on the ball. Romelu Lukaku nicked the ball of Lewis Dunk and after a quick counter-attack gave the Belgian a decent chance at goal, Lukaku snatched at the shot and it went wide.

This was as good as it got for United all match. Brighton had settled into the match and started to dictate terms. They took the lead in 25th minute through Glen Murray, as United’s defence were far too narrow. Neither Ashley Young, Eric Bailly or eventually Victor Lindelof could get across in time to prevent the cross and goal.

Brighton made it two in two minutes. After a penalty box scramble, Shane Duffy slammed the ball home.

Bailly’s rash tackle gave Pascal Gross the chance to score from the penalty spot. An opportunity he didn’t relinquish despite the ball deflecting off De Gea’s knees before lifting into the roof of the net.

This led to Manchester United’s second half to be as flat as a shrivelled balloon. Paul Pogba pulled one back from the penalty spot again with seconds remaining, but it was all little too late in a once again lethargic performance.

Jose Mourinho was asked after the game on Sky Sports what his thoughts were on the performance and he was keen to stress, his side made too many mistakes.

"“Too many mistakes. We were always punished by every mistake we made. The accumulation of the mistakes and the punishment of these mistakes by goals was giving confidence to Brighton and took our confidence from us.”"

Asked further whether Mourinho was shocked by what he saw from his players, the Portuguese responded:

"“I was not excepting big mistakes because these were not small mistakes, we made big mistakes and we were punished by these big mistakes.”"

Despite this, Mourinho was careful not to name any individual players. Famously, towards the end of last season, he was criticised for calling out players such as Marcus Rashford and Anthony Martial after their poor performances at the AMEX. Therefore, this time, Jose highlighted the hypocrisy of the media after being pushed to criticise his team.

"“When I am critical of my players you choose to not except it. The press the pundits are critical of me when I go in this direction. so do not ask me to go in this direction because it is not good for me.”"

Another intriguing answer Mourinho gave was to a question about the much-discussed failure to bring in another centre-half in the summer transfer window. Classically, when Mourinho doesn’t want to answer a question, he doesn’t! And all he said was, “The window opens on the 1st of January. It is [now] closed.”

Finally, the Manchester United boss brought some light to Alexis Sanchez’ injury, stating, “It is not a bad thing.” And that the Chilean will be back in roughly one to two weeks, however, they are yet to see the results of tests.