Jose Mourinho Reveals Why Man Utd Ace Mkhitaryan Didn't Play Against Newcastle

Jose Mourinho has explained why he opted to drop Henrikh Mkhitaryan for Manchester United's victory over Newcastle last Saturday.

The Armenia international was not part of Mourinho's starting lineup for the eventual 4-1 win over the Magpies amid claims that he was dropped completely for his average form of late.

However, in quotes published by the Manchester Evening News, the Portuguese boss revealed that he had decided to play Anthony Martial and Marcus Rashford from the off - a decision that paid off as both played their parts in United's first two goals of the game.

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He said: "Mkhitaryan is not playing because we had lots of options for that match.

"I decided to play Rashford and Martial together. The question for many weeks was why Rashford and Martial don’t play together and now it’s why isn’t Mkhitaryan playing. 

"The answer is very simple: Until the international board change the rules I can only start with 11."

When pressed on the issue further, Mourinho hit out at the assembled press for consistently querying why he had chosen not to play some players in certain matches.

The ex-Chelsea and Inter Milan gaffer went on to state that it was impossible to make the media happy with his team selections, and wondered why there were no questions over some of his other players not starting.

Mourinho added: "I think that is a bit frustrating for me. The fact that there is always a question about some player who is not playing or in the best of his form, no questions about Martial, no questions about Chris Smalling, it’s always about players in a certain moment, a certain match, a certain period, who didn’t play or was not my option. 

"The story is always the thing. In some positions where you don’t have injuries, you don’t have options, and always the same players are playing, in the midfield it was the same a bit. 

"No Carrick, no Pogba, no Fellaini and every match was Herrera and Matic and the kid McTominay had his opportunities to play. 

"In this moment, we have Pogba, Fellaini, Matic, Herrera, McTominay, so I can imagine next week I can imagine you will ask why is this player not playing."