It’s A Long Time Until Christmas For Jose

There’s massive pressure on Jose Mourinho going into Monday night’s game against Tottenham.

Mourinho Woes
He’s not coming across happy in any of his interviews at the moment. Of course this isn’t anything new. He hasn’t looked happy or been himself for at least a year now and certainly doesn’t look settled.

The team have been very much up and down. I don’t necessarily agree with the idea that you have to play a certain way because you’re a manager of a certain club but they’re not playing like a side that’s together.

I don’t think Mourinho is helping himself with the way that he’s conducting his interviews and there is an element of pressure on him.

Look at the Pogba situation. His agent isn’t necessarily doing his client any favours with the things that he’s saying which puts more pressure on Pogba and in turn, Mourinho.

The fact that Ed Woodward sat in his seat after their defeat to Brighton sends a message that he’s not quite happy

…with the way that Mourinho is doing things and of course with the way that they’re playing either.

Zidane Rumours
There’s a lot of talk about Zinedine Zidane being interested in taking over from Mourinho at the club. Do I see that happening? No; not at the moment anyway.

There’s been so much investment in that side, not from the transfer point of view but in terms of the wage bill and the trust that they’ve put in a lot of the players over the course of the last couple of seasons and the trust that has been put in Mourinho.

So I don’t necessarily think the Zinedine Zidane scenario would happen overnight. If it were to happen, it would definitely be a few months down the line. It could be a very long spell for Mourinho from now until Christmas!

Liverpool On The Rise
I was very impressed with Liverpool against Crystal Palace last weekend, not with how they opened Palace up but I think over the last few seasons Liverpool have lost games against sides that have played the way Palace played against them.

Liverpool were so good defensively, particularly Van Dijk and Gomez albeit that partnership is in its infancy as it’s only two games into the season. The goalkeeper hasn’t been tested yet so we’ll wait and see when he is seriously tested in the next few weeks.

Attack wise they’re going to create chances and score goals, that’s a given. The squad looks so much better this season and they will definitely be the side that will challenge Man City the most.

Super City
Guardiola’s side are favourites for a reason and the way they’ve opened up sides in the first few games has shown this. Kevin De Bruyne could be a key miss for them but the way I look at it is that they’ve got personality to come in and plug that hole they’ve missed with him. Silva, Aguero and Jesus all look excellent so far.

It’s two years down the line now with Guardiola and everyone seems to know what the manager wants. They’ve got different ways of beating different sides; they’re a different class and I do think they will win the Premier League.