Jose Mourinho took the managerial job at Manchester United in 2016 and has since managed 123 games, winning 73, with a win percentage of 61%. The 3-0 defeat against Tottenham on Monday night was his 23rd loss as a United manager and surely one of his worst home defeats yet.
Despite the humbling scoreline, the Red Devils had started the game quite strong and were the better side over the first half, where Lukaku missed with an open goal at his mercy.
Tottenham took advantage of United’s poor defending and after the break, scored 2 quickfire goals via Kane and Moura. Moura added a third in the dying minutes to pile on the misery at Old Trafford.
The game ended 3-0, with Mourinho losing in cool in the post-match news conference and demanding respect from the journalists:
“Do you know what was the result? 3-0. 3-0. Do you know what this means? [Holding up three fingers] 3-0, but also it means three Premierships, and I won more Premierships alone than the other 19 managers together. Three for me and two for them. Three for me and two for them. Respect, respect, respect man!”
It was clear that the result had got to his head and why not. Manchester United’s home defeat at the hands of Tottenham on Monday night was Mourinho’s worst home defeat in his entire managerial career.
His time at United has been mixed, to say the least so far, as he has overseen inconsistent wins and unexpected defeats in tandem.
A week on from the Brighton game, United needed a response as Spurs visited Old Trafford on 28th August 2018. Mourinho rang in 6 changes to his team. Luke Shaw became the only defender to start all the games for United this season, as Valencia, Jones and Smalling replaced Young, Bailly and Lindelof.
Matic, Herrera and Lingard were the other new faces in the team. Strangely, Mourinho opted for a back 3 with Herrera as the right centre back. United were the better team in the first half, and it did look like they would recover from the horrible performance against Brighton, but it was not to be.
Lukaku and Lingard were guilty of missing easy chances and the midfield and defence were split open by Spurs, who scored 2 goals in 2 minutes in the second half through Kane and Moura and then added a third 6 minutes from time to inflict further misery on to Mourinho.
It was the Portuguese manager’s biggest home defeat of his career and United are now in their worst start to the season since 1992/93. It was also the first time in his career that Mourinho had lost 2 of the opening three games of the season.
Mourinho seemed to defend his player after the game, saying he was pleased with their performance. The alarm bells were already ringing last weekend, but those became a lot louder on Monday night. It prompted a vicious response from the manager in the press conference later on. It was, after all, a night of shame for him and his team.