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Football

10th May 2018

Man Utd fans don’t know what to make of tonight’s starting XI

Mourinho has taken the chance to experiment with his team selection

Reuben Pinder

Jose Mourinho

It’s a meaningless game, but there’s always something to moan about

Many football fans view the world with a binary outlook. Things are either very good or very bad. It seems increasingly impossible to simply be indifferent about trivial things. If you want proof you only have to look at the reaction to Manchester United’s line up tonight.

United travel to West Ham tonight for a typically meaningless end of season match with very little to play for; the title was won a while ago, West Ham are now safe. The most interesting aspect of the game is that David Moyes (as well as Patrice Evra and Javier Hernandez) are competing against their old club.

José Mourinho evidently saw this as a chance to experiment with his team selection, deploying Alexis Sánchez as a striker, with Paul Pogba and Jessi Lingard either side of him in a narrow attacking trio, as well as playing three central defenders. Oh, and Luke Shaw got a game too.

Some outrage came from Anthony Martial still not being given a chance through the middle, even in the absence of Romelu Lukaku. Although, reading Mourinho’s comments after the Brighton game, that shouldn’t be a surprise.

Others were pleased to see Sánchez back in the side.

And some fans were not happy about Eric Bailly’s exclusion.

Also, these two tweets were posted within the same minute. I don’t know either.