JOSE MOURINHO has taken a dig at Paul Pogba revealing he had once asked to leave the stadium in his Rolls Royce rather than the team bus.
Mourinho and Pogba had a turbulent relationship at Manchester United with the manager finally losing his job in December.
The problems started in January 2018 when Mourinho subbed Pogba after an hour in the 2-0 defeat to Tottenham.
Mourinho had spoken to the midfielder, instructing him on how he wanted to operate, before hooking him shortly after with the game dead.
From there there were comments and public spats and the relationship never full recovered.
Pogba’s turnaround at United under Ole Gunnar Solskjaer has been remarkable and showed that issues were indeed hampering his performances.
Now though Mourinho has publicly revealed an incident after a home game where Pogba, who he branded ‘His Excellency’, had asked to leave in his private car.
“We would play a team that was 30 kilometres from Manchester and a player asked me if after the game he could return to Manchester without the team and go on his own,” Mourinho said.
“I told him ‘If we went to London and you wanted to stay there, that would be one thing. But this is close, it doesn’t make sense’.
“The guy was upset. But then we won the game and he asked me again. Because I was happy, I gave in a little and said: ‘At least leave on the bus and ask your chauffeur to catch up with you 10 minutes from the stadium, then go as you wish’.
“And this guy in the locker-room still wasn’t happy. I went to the press conference and when I arrived at the team bus, parked beside it was a Rolls-Royce with his chauffeur.
“After all, the car was new and His Excellency would like to leave the stadium in his Rolls-Royce.
“Now how do we deal with this? You (tell him) never go in the Rolls? You can go when I’m happy? Or you solve this thing in another way to get me ‘on vacation’.”
Pogba’s future at United remains a talking point after he admitted it was a dream to play at Real Madrid and Zinedine Zidane’s comments this week about signing him.
But Solskjaer claims he is happy and will stay to be part of the team he builds around at Old Trafford.
“It doesn’t really concern me [the comments] because I’ve had a chat with Paul and we’re fine,” he said.
“He’s going to do his utmost here because he knows I’m very fond of him as a player and a person and he is important for us. There is no issue. He’s important here.”
Source:www.express.co.uk