Tottenham Hotspur manager, Jose Mourinho, warned his players of the danger posed by Paul Pogba and his ‘beautiful’ passes, when both sides faced each other at the end of last season, footage from Amazon Prime’s All or Nothing documentary has revealed.
It was both sides’ first fixture after the restart in June, with Pogba named on the bench for the time after shaking off a long-term injury.
Spurs took the lead through Steven Bergwijn, but the game changed when Pogba was introduced in the second half.
Pogba won the penalty that resulted in the equalizer scored by Bruno Fernandes, before setting up Marcus Rashford to net the winner.
Before then, at half time, Mourinho had underlined the importance of stopping Pogba when he comes on, speaking in glowing terms about the Frenchman despite their poor relationship at United.
Speaking to the squad at half-time in the dressing room, Mourinho said: “I think, for sure, sooner or later Pogba is coming. And every time Pogba has the ball, he will have the vision, he will have the quality of pass.
“So Pogba will improve the quality of passing, so we need to press him. And we need to control what is far from him.
“There is a lot of space to counter-attack and to kill them.”
As the players stood up to go back out on the pitch, Mourinho shouted: “Don’t let Pogba shoot! If he approaches the box, press the ball if he shoots!”