Mourinho Reacts To FA Cup Progress

Jose Mourinho was pleased with the result but wanted more from the performance of his team as Manchester United reached the Emirates FA Cup semi-finals for the second time in three seasons.

The Reds beat Brighton 2-0 courtesy of goals from Romelu Lukaku and Nemanja Matic in Saturday evening’s quarter-final at Old Trafford to advance to the last four of a competition that United won for a 12th time in 2016.

Mourinho’s men will discover their opponents at Wembley next month once the semi-final draw has been conducted on Sunday evening at around 18:30 GMT, immediately after Chelsea’s tie against Leicester City.

Speaking to MUTV, the boss was satisfied with the outcome and felt Matic, who was voted Man of the Match by fans on Twitter after providing a goal and an assist, was the Reds' best player on the night.

"I am happy that we go to Wembley again," he said. "I am happy with the qualification to the semi-final, but I am not happy with the performance. I expected more, we worked for more. We need more personality. Personality has a big influence in the quality that you show.

"I think [Nemanja] Matic was by far the best player in the team. Clearly, the personality, the desire, no fear to play, no fear to make mistakes. The team didn’t play as well as we prepared. These players, they need to play with pressure and feel the pressure."

Mourinho went on: "I don’t expect the players to relax after a defeat. We play four important matches at home in the past couple of weeks, we beat Chelsea and Liverpool, we reach the semi-final, we lost against Sevilla which is a match that looks like it deletes everything good we did until now, but today was very important to win the match. Two knockouts at home would have been really negative for us so I am happy that we won."

United earned a hard-fought 1-0 victory over Brighton in the league back in November at Old Trafford and the boss felt the Seagulls played without freedom, with Premier League survival their main aim, but the Reds had a measure of command throughout.

"I'm really happy with the result and I'm really happy with the control we had," he said. "Of course, they had a reaction in the second half between minute 15 and 30, no more than that. Of course they had that result and they can play football.

"It's a match without any kind of pressure for them and their big target in the end is to stay in the Premier League, which they are going to do for sure. But today, nothing to lose for them and they had a reaction but, apart from that, we kept control of the game and the result which is good."

Mourinho also had words of encouragement for young midfielder Scott McTominay, despite being a little disappointed by the overall display from the Reds.

“I have to say, for example, that Scott McTominay lost more passes today than in all of the [other] matches he played together but he was a Manchester United player and, for me, a Manchester United player is a player that when he plays bad, he gives to the team," the boss explained.

"That's a question of personality, that's a Manchester United player for me. The perfect Manchester United player for me is a player that has personality and quality and is consistent on that. But when you play bad, and as a football player you can play bad, you must have that personality that the kid of 20 years old had."