Mourinho's View On Win Over Sunderland

Jose Mourinho spoke to MUTV after the 3-1 win against Sunderland on Boxing Day at Old Trafford. Here's what the manager had to say...

Better after the break
"I liked the second half. I didn't like the first half. It was 1-0 at half-time and I think there was a clear penalty in our favour [when Lamine Kone flattened Juan Mata inside the box]. In spite of that, I don't think we deserved to be winning 1-0. They were organised well, this team came here to close and try to be dangerous on the counter-attack, with the long ball to [Victor] Anichebe to hold, and they did well. I did like the second half, we brought to the game the way we have been playing in the past couple of months, playing really well with intensity, creativity and we were dynamic. I like the second half very much as we could have scored five or six. It's three points, 12 points from four matches. We've played well for a long time but points are what we need now."

Half-time instructions
"My message was that the game was going in the direction where we were in control but it was apathetic control. You never know. We needed to accelerate the game, press higher, play faster and short passes with more speed of the ball. We needed to bring the game to a different level and we did that from minute one [of the second half]. With Micki [Henrikh Mkhitaryan] and [Anthony] Martial, we intensified even more the game and we scored the second and third."

Micki's strike was something special
"He has scored beautiful goals all his career. In this moment, [there are the] goals but also the defensive work and also creativity. And I'm so happy he came back after this injury and came back with his happiness and the feeling that the people at Old Trafford love him. That's a very important thing for him."

Zlatan on fire
"He should score more! He had a [chance for] 2-0 in front of [Jordan] Pickford that I thought: '2-0 and game over and no'. But, independent of the goals, his work is amazing. I saw him making runs against Kone and Papy Djilobodji, young guys, but he was faster and stronger than them. Great."

Middlesbrough next up
"It's a difficult one. Middlesbrough need points as they lost today against Burnley. Aitor Karanka will come here obviously to try and he is a big friend of mine. You forget friends in football and he will come here to try to get something from that match. It's one more difficult match."