16:18  ,  July 13, 2016

Tom Jones: Mkhitaryan will cope at Man Utd

Henrikh Mkhitaryan is an unbelievable talent.

English specialist Tom Jones, who had worked at the coaching staff of the Armenia national football squad, stated the aforementioned speaking about national team captain and midfielder Henrikh Mkhitaryan, who recently transferred to Manchester United (England) from Borussia Dortmund (Germany).

“The first time I saw Henrikh was when he was playing for the Under-21s,” the Man United website quoted Jones as saying. “I was there sitting with Vardan [Minasyan], who was a coach with the national team and ended up taking over when I left.

“I said: ‘He’s too good to be playing in that team. Get him in the full squad.’ From that time, he just joined the full squad and was regularly part of the training.”

“He was a great lad,” recalled Jones. “Really, really polite and well spoken. The good thing as well, from my point of view, was his English was very good.”

“When he’s got the ball at his feet, he just runs at people and simply creates so many problems for defenders because his first thought is to get at them. People don’t like that, of course, and, when they start coming and stepping out, he is sliding balls in between them. He is very clever like that - he could make a goal and score a goal. (…). He gets at people, runs at people and defenders hate that.”

“They’ve [i.e. Armenia] never qualified for a major tournament but, if you look at some of their results, they can always turn you over,” he said. “I just didn’t see the opposition goalkeeper because we were camped in our own half on damage limitation. I changed that mentality and just said: ‘Let’s press up the pitch and stop them playing.’ It worked wonders for us and everybody could see the benefits and a change in that mindset from that day.” 

“I’m sure Henrikh was already an idol in Armenia when playing for Borussia Dortmund,” he reasoned. “To go to a club like United is a different level again for a player from such a small country, but I think he will cope.

“The boy is a hell of a talent,” he insisted, “and we are all looking forward to seeing him in the red shirt [Manchester United].”

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