Manchester United manager, Jose Mourinho, has admitted he would have loved to keep Morgan Schneiderlin and Bastian Schweinsteiger at the club.
United are short of midfielders, with Paul Pogba injured and Marouane Fellaini suspended after his red card in the Manchester Derby. It leaves Michael Carrick and Ander Herrera as the only senior midfielders available to Mourinho.
Schneiderlin left United in a £22million move to Everton in January, while Schweinsteiger joined MLS team Chicago Fire last month.
“Our decision, our decision,” Mourinho stressed of the decision to let them leave.
“To have lots of players without playing is something that the players don’t want.
“We didn’t tell Morgan, ‘We want to sell you’, Morgan asked and said, ‘Please sell me, I want to go and play every game.’ So sometimes there is always this dilemma of keep a bigger squad, but then the players don’t want to stay.
“Even the younger players, when they are not playing, they ask to leave, so it’s very hard and we arrive in an extreme situation where, I think it must be unique in football, where we have two cruciate ligaments in the same match. In my career I had one in 17 years. One cruciate in 17 years. And now, against Anderlecht, I have two. In one match.
“We are very unlucky is the only thing we can say, and the other small injuries, the Pogba one, Valencia last week, are the injuries of fatigue, the accumulation of matches, which is normal. Smalling and Jones were with the English national team, training.
“So maybe it’s a blessing, an opportunity to make the team stronger, maybe it’s an opportunity to make them mentally stronger. Maybe it’s a blessing, so let’s see if they can comeback.”
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