Jose Mourinho’s Europa League U-turn: from disregard to necessity

Eight months can make a major difference. To a manager, to a mindset, to Manchester United. Jose Mourinho stated in September “the Europa League is not a competition that Manchester United wants.” It wasn’t one Mourinho, the man who mocked Rafa Benitez for winning it, really wanted.

Eight months later, Mourinho engulfed his Celta Vigo counterpart Eduardo Berizzo, when the final whistle blew. The sense of relief was overwhelming. Nervily, unconvincingly, crucially, United had progressed. Victory came at a cost but he is 90 minutes away from a strange vindication. United’s continental campaign will come full circle. They began against Dutch opponents, losing 1-0 to Feyenoord, and will end against one of the Netherlands’ other powers, meeting Ajax. Mourinho has executed an unwieldy U-turn out of necessity, which may position United to return to the Champions League, via the back door, via the long route, but with the gleam of silverware to light their passage.

Mourinho beat a tactical retreat from pursuing a top-four place; win the final and it will seem a case of clinical targeting of the more attainable goal. Yet United were not clinical here. The risk entailed in that gamble was apparent when Facundo Roncaglia equalised on the night, putting Celta Vigo a moment away from eliminating United, when Eric Bailly was sent off with the Spaniards’ goalscorer and when United ended the night hanging on, with their three starting attackers, Marcus Rashford, Henrikh Mkhitaryan and Jesse Lingard, all substituted. It took a 96th-minute clearance from his own six-yard box by Michael Carrick to secure a final berth.

Mourinho has spent weeks bemoaning defensive absentees. Now, after branding this – perhaps in a slip of the tongue – the biggest game in United’s history, he approaches what is actually the biggest in their season without his pivotal centre-back, suspended after losing his cool. This United side do not exude the control of the great Mourinho teams, but they may end the season with twin trophies.

They live dangerously. A previous miscreant glimpsed redemption. Marouane Fellaini took an unconventional approach to booking his place in a European semi-final, his Manchester derby red card bringing a domestic suspension and thus a guaranteed start when eligible. He helped book United a place in the final, his far-post header proving their only goal. Yet the catalyst was the crosser. Rashford has assumed responsibility since Zlatan Ibrahimovic’s season ended. He delivered the extra-time winner against Anderlecht, the superb free kick in Spain and then the centre for Fellaini to tower over Pablo Hernandez. Rashford has that invaluable combination of talent and temperament. A season dominated by Ibrahimovic could be determined by his teenage understudy.

The temptation is to pronounce Fellaini an unlikely scorer on such a stage, but United’s previous goals in European semi-finals at Old Trafford came courtesy of Darron Gibson and Anderson, so perhaps he is not an anomaly in an otherwise glorious tradition.

And perhaps there was something fitting in Fellaini being the finisher. He is not a glamorous player and this Europa League campaign has not been an exercise in glamour. Mourinho is the superstar manager who has been slumming it in some of European football’s less fashionable outposts on an interminable journey to Sweden via Holland, Turkey, Ukraine, France, Russia, Belgium and Spain. There has been a certain ungainliness to it all. The ends should justify the means but it has felt more about staying power than sheer quality. United have outlasted everyone bar Ajax. Mourinho, who has fought battles with some of the game’s greats, is now winning his war of attrition.

United have won ties they ought to win, which is not to suggest they should be deprived of credit for doing so.

A Celta Vigo team compiled for £32 million less than Mino Raiola is making from Paul Pogba’s move back to Old Trafford were underdogs. If United always looked the likelier to proceed, the underdogs bridged the financial gulf on the night.

They often threatened. It might have been different had Daley Blind been dismissed for a studs-up lunge on Pablo Hernandez or but for a fine early save from Sergio Romero, who is presenting a case to start in Stockholm. They exited with reputation enhanced, United advanced with Mourinho’s perhaps about to be burnished further.

He is now 90 minutes away from joining Sir Alex Ferguson, Bob Paisley and Giovanni Trapattoni in the select band to win four major European trophies. A manager who often likes to be judged by his medal collection wants this competition now.