Bryan Roy: 'Jose Mourinho is killing football'

By Matthew Jones, Reporter | 22 March 2018

Former Netherlands player Bryan Roy slams Manchester United manager Jose Mourinho for his treatment of forward Marcus Rashford this season.

Former Netherlands player Bryan Roy has hit out at Manchester United boss Jose Mourinho for his treatment of Marcus Rashford.

The Portuguese manager has consistently left Rashford out of his starting lineup this season, despite the 20-year-old scoring a 10-minute brace against Liverpool earlier this month.

Rashford is currently on international duty with England as they prepare for their upcoming friendly against the Netherlands, and ex-Nottingham Forest winger Roy has sympathised with the striker ahead of the game on Friday.

"You guys have a great team, Rashford is a huge talent, I'm a big fan of him," Roy told The Mirror.

"He can shoot, he can dribble, he is fast, he is smart, he's very disciplined in the way he behaves. Those kind of players should play every single week. I don't understand why Mourinho doesn't play him every week because he is the biggest talent of England. Then you are going to buy Alexis Sanchez, so what are you going to do with Rashford? Those sort of things I don't understand."

Roy is not the first to criticise Mourinho's treatment of Rashford, as Frank de Boer lashed out at the Red Devils boss several weeks ago, only for Mourinho to react by calling him the worst manager in Premier League history.

"I saw what happened between Frank and Mourinho. OK, so Frank de Boer didn't have a good spell at Crystal Palace but what he said is right, coaches like Mourinho they kill football, that has nothing to do with entertaining fans, nothing at all," Roy added.

"When someone like Frank had a bad spell as a coach, it doesn't mean he can't say anything. It's a vision. The vision that Frank has is the same as Johan Cruyff had, he would have told the world exactly the same. We were brought up by him. Mourinho doesn't think about the fans, he thinks about results, not fans and that should stop. It kills football. Look at Manchester United, they play crap football. It's awful.

"How are you going to compare that with the time of Sir Alex Ferguson? What's happening? Are we crazy? Is everyone getting crazy? I cannot believe this. This is Manchester United. Football is for the fans, not for money, money comes with that because without football it is all nothing. The first thing that should be is how to play entertaining football and to win. That's what should be in every single coach's head."

Rashford has six goals in 27 outings this season, 13 of which came as a substitute.