ESPN: Mourinho should not take too long to give Mkhitaryan his chance

Armenia national football squad captain and midfielder and Manchester United (England) newcomer Henrikh Mkhitaryan needs confidence, wrote the website of ESPN, a US-based global cable and satellite television channel, in an article.

“Though the playmaker has been frustrated by a lack of playing time thus far, he may be comforted to regard himself as the icing on the cake. [Man United manager José] Mourinho has preferred Juan Mata and Jesse Lingard thus far, not because they are more gifted but because they were, in his view, better suited to the opposition.

“But Mourinho should not take too long to give Mkhitaryan his chance. The 27-year-old needs confidence and it is worth recalling the words of Arjen Robben, who once stated that to work with Mourinho you have to be ‘mentally very strong.’

“Mkhitaryan's form has been dependent upon the approval of his manager and he has yet to be given the tactical freedom that Mourinho afforded Paul Pogba vs. Southampton. It is to be hoped that an opportunity is given sooner rather than later, given the failure of Kevin De Bruyne, another gifted attacking midfielder, to fit into Mourinho's plans at Chelsea.

“In the few minutes that Mkhitaryan was on the field at Old Trafford vs. Southampton, he combined beautifully with Pogba on the counterattack, playing in the Frenchman for a chance that he probably should have scored,” the ESPN article reads, in particular.

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