Jose Mourinho haspraised'phenomenal' centre-back Marcos Rojo following their 2-1 win over Crystal Palace, despite the Argentine being involved in a second two-footed tackle controversy this month, adding: "I am not going to discuss the Rojo challenge."
"He is an aggressive, clean player, probably playing the best football of his career,� said the United boss at the same ground where Eric Cantona was infamously sent off for a similar (kind of) challenge just over 20 years ago when he was playing some of the best football of his career.
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Back to the present day,Mourinho continued:We deserved it, we were the best team, they [Palace] had just a little reaction, just a little reaction, but they had it and they scored a goal in that period. Then we had the best period in the game. In the first half we had control but in the last 20 minutes we were super dominant. We created a lot, had a big desire and we won deservedly in the end.�
The Portuguese was also full of praise for summer signings Paul Pogba and Zlatan Ibrahimovic, particularly the latter,saying:I think they both were phenomenal during the game. The pass obviously is fantastic, the movement is great, the shot is good, but for me I probably prefer what Zlatan did after the goal because that was phenomenal.
"He played in front of the back four, winning every ball in the air, controlling on the chest, cooling down the play, he is phenomenal. It is not just the goals that he scores, it is not just the goal that gives us three points, it is the leadership, the desire, the passion. Fantastic!�
The United boss gave a small update on the condition of Eric Bailly, reporting: "We don't know [how serious it is]. It is not the same knee, it is the other one. It is the left knee. So he is not coming back to a previous injury."
He went on to comment on how well United are doing in terms of keeping up with title rivals, saying: "We are doing enough for that. If we had the points we lost at home in the draws in matches that we did more than enough to win then we would be close to the top of the league, but we lost these points and at this moment we are just closing the gap to the top four positions.
"There are three more matches before the end of the year and let's see how it looks on 31 December.�