Mourinho Confirms Four Manchester United Starters Sidelined vs. Leicester
Manchester United boss Jose Mourinho has confirmed he will be without four key first-team players when his side take on Leicester City on Saturday.
The Red Devils return to Premier League action following their disappointing Carabao Cup exit at the hands of Championship outfit Bristol City in midweek, where the Portuguese manager made a number of changes to the starting lineup which overcame West Bromwich Albion last weekend.
One of those was captain Antonio Valencia, who suffered a hamstring injury during his side's 2-1 win over the Baggies, as well as several others, including Michael Carrick, Eric Bailly and Marouane Fellaini, who all still remain sidelined for the visit of the Foxes to Old Trafford.
"He’s not available", Mourinho told his pre-match press conference when asked about an update on Fellaini, as quoted by the Manchester Evening News.
"I don’t know. Michael Carrick, no. But not for the Christmas period.
"Valencia is out as you know, Eric Bailly is having surgery right now, or is just finishing or is still there, who else? Nobody else, everything is okay."
Despite being unable to field a number of players through injury on Wednesday evening, the United boss was able to witness a few of those who have not been able to force their way into his starting lineup as regularly as they would have hoped.
These included left back Luke Shaw and midfielder Henrikh Mkhitaryan, both of whom have been linked with moves away from the north west giants in recent times.
However, even though neither could do enough to secure the Red Devils' second successive semi-final in the competition, Mourinho has ruled out making rash decisions on one performance.
"No. I don’t make decisions based on only one game or one feeling or one night, not at all", the Portuguese manager added.
"I could be critical with my players but they did enough to win, they lost when they were the only team people believed could win.
"So we move on and we move on quickly because we have another match."
