Manchester United sack Jose Mourinho - a £24m risk worth taking?

Manchester United have this morning sacked manager Jose Mourinho, ending the Portuguese boss’ two-year spell at Old Trafford.

The Red Devils have finally made the decision to end their relationship with manager Jose Mourinho after a very disappointing start to the season.

United currently sit in sixth place and with very little hope of even reaching the top five between now and the end of the season.

Mourinho’s position as manager has been much debated this season with the poor performances on the pitch also being topped up by the Portuguese’s poor relationships with key players in the squad.

However, many thought United wouldn’t take the decision due to the £24 million cost involved in cancelling Mourinho’s contract. But even that scary amount of money wasn’t enough to save Jose, who now returns to unemployment.

So, was it a £24 million gamble worth taking? Or have Manchester United acted prematurely to please their highly-paid stars?

A risk worth taking? It has to be, doesn’t it? This is a club that has been rotting under Jose Mourinho’s control. It’s been tiresome listening to his interviews and watching his bad attitude have a negative effect on these young players.

His man management proved to be his downfall at Chelsea, leading to a fractured changing room just one season after the same group of players won the Premier League.

It’s taken even less time this time around. Mourinho’s poisonous presence has led to a poisonous dressing room and boy has it shown on the pitch.

At times, this team, which featured at least two players who are talked about as the best in the world in their position, has looked clueless. When you’ve spent as much money as Jose Mourinho has at Manchester United, there cannot be any excuses for performances like we have seen this season.

There’ll be talk of player pressure, of players like Paul Pogba ‘getting what they want’, but when you see how some of these players have been treated, you could hardly blame them for throwing their toys out of the pram.

Jose Mourinho remains a top-class coach, one of the best in the world, but if he doesn’t adjust his man-management style, fewer and fewer top clubs are going to take the chance on him.

Trophies have been his saving grace, but at United, he has won just three, including the Community Shield. Clubs are surely now going to ask whether he is worth the risk when he has a track record, in recent times, of leaving clubs in worse positions that when he took over. This United dressing room could hardly be in a worse place.

Football management is about more than coaching, it’s probably more than 50% about man management, getting the best out of players and getting players to play for you as a manager.

Mourinho misses that and it has shown during his woeful spell at Old Trafford.

It’s an expensive decision for Manchester United, but it’s also important to keep in context that this is a club that has the luxury of making such decisions. It’s a club that has the money to protect itself in these unfortunate circumstances.

It’s a decision they had to make to ensure things don’t get any worse, and to ensure there’s enough time for someone to fix the mess left behind by Jose Mourinho.

Now it’s about getting a new manager in with limited hesitation to ensure that person has a transfer window to work with, and to ensure they have half a season to put things right before having a go at the top four and maybe even better next season.

This huge club cannot afford another season of failure beyond this one.