Deco Issues Mourinho Warning

Manchester United's players must learn to deal with Jose Mourinho's public criticism, according to former Chelsea midfielder Deco.

Mourinho's encouraging start to life at Old Trafford - which began with four consecutive victories - hit rough ground in September after defeats to Manchester City, Feyenoord and Watford.

Summer signing Henrikh Mkhitaryan and Jesse Lingard, substituted at half-time in the Manchester derby, publicly bore the brunt of Mourinho's first defeat as United boss.

Luke Shaw was then singled out for his performance at Vicarage Road as Watford inflicted United's third defeat in a week.

But former Portugal international Deco, who won the Champions League under Mourinho at Porto, believes the level of criticism is part and parcel of playing at a "big club".

"If you are playing at a club like Chelsea, United, Barcelona, Madrid - the big clubs - you need to be prepared to do your best," he said.

"If you want to play at a high level you need to be able deal with everything."

The managerial style which has yielded so much success throughout Mourinho's career came back to bite him last season as Premier League champions Chelsea imploded under his watch.

Mourinho called out a number of stars at Stamford Bridge when their performances failed to meet his standards, most notably Eden Hazard, while he took off substitute Nemanja Matic in a 3-1 defeat to Southampton.

However, having been on the end of Mourinho's wrath, Deco insists such treatment is good for players in the long term.

"I don't like the coach criticising me, but he knows better than us players and sometimes he does that not to pressure players but to give something different," said Deco, speaking at the launch of the Star Sixes football tournament at Stamford Bridge.

"He knows better than us, he's with them every day and of course the players don't like it but sometimes it works.

"At Porto, sometimes publicly he did the same thing. It is part of his work, he knows sometimes the player reactions will be different. When you lose and when you are not playing very well you need to improve.

"Whether the coach says it on the media or in the dressing room, it is the same thing, when the team is not playing well everyone knows that they need to do better.

"Maybe Jose knows that when they have lost a few games they need to improve. I don't think it's a problem."

Credit: Skysports.com