Manchester United midfielder Paul Pogba has insisted that he is eager to win more trophies after helping his side to a 2-1 win over Leicester City.
The 25-year-old, surprisingly named in Jose Mourinho’s starting lineup on Friday evening, scored an early penalty for the Red Devils as they kicked off their Premier League campaign with a narrow victory. Pogba only returned to training earlier this week, having starred for France in their triumphant World Cup campaign, but the captain for the night was happy to play a part and now hopes to add more silverware to his collection.
“We should start the Premier League with a win and we did,” he told Sky Sports News. “I didn’t have any pre-season games; I came back on Monday so it was very hard for the legs. The performance was OK, but we want to go up.
“Winning the World Cup is in the past. I like challenges, I want to progress and win more trophies. The World Cup will stay in my mind, but I want to win all the trophies. I haven’t won the Premier League, I haven’t won the Champions League, I haven’t won the European Championships so there are more to win
Luke Shaw was also on target for United seven minutes from the end, before Jamie Vardy pulled one back in added time.
Manchester United manager Jose Mourinho has revealed the reason Paul Pogba will captain Manchester United. Mourinho has stated that the Frenchman will captain the Red Devils because of his links to the Manchester United academy.
Pogba returned to pre-season training on Monday after helping France to World Cup glory and was expected to be named on the bench against Leicester. Jose Mourinho pulled up a surprise by not only including the 25-year-old in his starting XI but naming his as the team’s skipper. Antonio Valencia has succeed the retired Michael Carrick as Manchester United captain but is unavailable to face Leicester due to injury so Pogba has stepped up to the plate.
Speaking ahead of kick off, Mourinho said: “Antonio Valencia is the captain but he is not here so Paul Pogba is captain. He has come up through the academy and he knows what the club means.”
Mourinho has a limited pool to work with due to a number of players being on holiday after their exploits at the World Cup. Romelu Lukaku is on the bench but Nemanja Matic and Jesse Lingard are not in the 18-man squad.
“The players involved in the World Cup semi-finals started training on Monday and some of them are involved today to help the team,” Mourinho said. Nemanja Matic is unavailable, Jesse Lingard doesn’t feel he is in a position to help us but Romelu Lukaku can give us a hand from the bench.”
Despite a disappointing summer in the transfer market, United are expected to challenge Manchester City for the Premier League title.
Mourinho also singled out Luke Shaw for what the Portuguese described as a “complete performance”.
The left-back scored what proved to be the winning goal with United’s second on 83 minutes – the first goal of his senior career.
With Mourinho keen to highlight the lack of options at his disposal after the World Cup and a testing summer transfer window, a reminder of the talent Shaw possesses proved timely for the United manager.
“His game was very complete,” Mourinho added. “If I forget the goal, which was an important goal for us, the performance was very complete.
“I think there was one defensive mistake, and probably the linesman could have helped him and given a free-kick against Leicester. But it was a very, very complete performance, now he has to just keep going.
“The mentality was very good, the tactical discipline was very good too. He still had the power to go forward and score an important goal for us.”