Jose Mourinho insists it’s ‘not fair’ that Man United will drop into the Europa

Jose Mourinho insists Manchester United should not be rewarded for their failure in the Champions League with an invitation into the Europa League.

United will join UEFA’s second tier competition at the last-32 stage and will be among the favourites to lift the trophy according to Tottenham boss Mourinho.

Spurs, having fought through two qualifying rounds, a play-off game and secured qualification from Group J with a game to spare, are also sure of a place in the knock-out phase.

Jose Mourinho insists Champions League teams shouldn’t drop into the Europa League

‘It’s a point of principle,’ said Mourinho. ‘If it happened to my team, I would feel exactly the same.

‘It is the way it is and honestly brings more quality to the competition. We cannot forget that. When you have eight new teams in the competition and eight teams that belong to another level, of course the level of the competition is going to improve, no doubts.

‘When the quality improves, the attention improves, and that’s a good thing for the competition but from the sporting point of view it’s not fair that a team that doesn’t succeed in one competition drops to another.

‘It’s just the principle. In football, when for some reason we don’t succeed unlucky, next season. But it is the way it is and it’s not a problem.’

Manchester United were dumped out of the Champions League on Wednesday evening

They failed to reach the knockout stages after failing to get a point in their last two games 

Tottenham face Royal Antwerp in London on Thursday and must win to top Group J and be seeded in the draw for the last-32. 

As a seeded team, they will avoid at this stage the other group winners and the eight teams from the Champions League, which include Manchester United and possibly Real Madrid and Ajax.

‘Manchester United become one of the top favourites to win the competition,’ said Mourinho. ‘The teams that drop from the Champions League are always strong teams; teams that normally don’t belong to that level of the Europa League competition.

‘Manchester United is one of the top teams. Their group was very hard: Paris Saint-Germain, Manchester United, Leipzig, very hard. 

‘We all knew it was not going to be easy for any one of them and we all knew that from that group a top team would drop to the Europa League.’

It’s not the first time Mourinho has reached into his book of mind games this season, having already exchanged barbs with Solskjaer when their two sides met in October.

It’s not the first time this season Mourinho has used mind-games to deflect pressure

Mourinho also couldn’t resist a few digs ahead of his clash with arch-rival Pep Guardiola

Mourinho also took aim at Manchester City and Gareth Southgate in the most recent international break, with the Portuguese manager claiming that the England winger was given plenty of time to rest before Spurs’ clash with Pep Guardiola’s side. 

The Special One also deflected the pressure from his players before Spurs’ London…