Manchester United have been under the microscope this week following the conclusion of the club’s internal investigation into Mason Greenwood. What are your thoughts on the process and the outcome?
Look, we are not where we want to be with our team. I have a lot of work. I have a lot of focus on my team and so I focus on the players who are available.
Were you expecting Mason Greenwood to be available to you? Did you want him to be?
As I said, I only have statements about our performance, our squad and where we have to improve because it’s clear we have to improve and I have to put every effort in to getting the team to perform.
With that in mind, has this been a challenging week? You’ve obviously lost two important players to injuries on top of everything else?
Yeh, but that is the situation. It’s normal. Top football. You go to the limits. Injuries coming up. Of course, it’s always disappointing, but you have to deal with it and therefore you construct a squad and we can deal with it.
Can I just ask you, throughout this process, have you spoken at all to Mason Greenwood?
As I said, I focus on the current squad and the players who are available.
Is Rasmus Hojlund available?
Not for tomorrow.
How near is he?
Near. Today was the first time he came into team training. So next week we expect him to do a full week with all the team trainings. So he’s very near to make the squad.
In terms of the injuries that you mentioned a moment ago, can you bring us any more detail on Mason Mount and Luke Shaw as to what the exact problems are and how long you expect to be without them?
We can’t do that as it’s personal these days. There will be for some period, absences. Luke will be longer than Mason.
So are you thinking weeks or months? I understand you can’t give the exact detail from what you said?
No, but what I said, Luke will be longer. And Mason, I think quicker.
Obviously, at left-back, you also have Tyrell Malacia injured at the moment. Do you have an update on his situation? How soon will he be back?
It will also take a few weeks before he will be back.
So do you think you have the solutions in the squad currently to cope with that?
Oh, definitely. We have the solutions in our squad to cope with that. We thought before the season about this scenario, what could happen. You hope to avoid the scenario that’s also clear. But if it happens, you have to be ready for it and we are ready to deal with it.
Do you understand why Manchester United fans do want to know your position on what’s happened with Mason Greenwood?
So once again, what Manchester United fans expect is Manchester United winning. And I’m responsible for that. And I have to put all my effort and all my focus in the current players who are available and in the current squad and make us play better than we do now.
Thinking about the play on the pitch, with Mason Mount injured, that midfield three at times against Tottenham looked like it might have been overrun slightly. How are you working to address that?
You always have to make clinical analysis and that assessment is not right. It’s not about the midfield, it was about the back and it was about the front and that’s why we were open. Nothing to do with the midfield, but I already said that straight after the game.
There were some fans criticising the fitness of some players. Casemiro got called out a bit. Is he fully fit at the moment?
If you see the numbers, you see he’s fully fit. Of our fitness, I don’t have any doubts they can do it but after 35 minutes against Spurs, they didn’t do it anymore. But after the first game, we were top, ranked first across the Premier League for fitness state.
And just on a player who has been linked away from the club, Eric Bailly. Are you able to tell us anything about a potential move to Marseille at all?
When we have news, we will give it straight away, but we don’t have it at this moment so we can’t say anything about it.
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