Mourinho to respect Europa League despite scheduling

Jose Mourinho has vowed that Manchester United will respect the Europa League this season despite his belief that competition will harm their chances of winning the Premier League title.

The Red Devils boss admits that Europe’s secondary competition is not one his club “wants” to be involved in, especially given the impact it will have on their schedule.

The Portuguese has slammed the fixture list that will see United face Liverpool and Chelsea next month either side of a Europa League game against Fenerbahce.

His side begin their European campaign against Feyenoord in Rotterdam and the Old Trafford boss is not hiding the fact he would rather not be playing Thursday night football.

“It is not a competition that Man United wants,” Mourinho told reporters.

“It is not one I want or the players, but it is a competition where we are and that is the reality.

“We have to respect the competition. We want to do well and for a club of our dimension it is not to be out of the competition in the group stage.”

United are 6.50 to win this season’s Europa League but Mourinho has warned it will have an impact domestically. “It’s more difficult, yes [to win the Premier League when you are playing in the Europa League].

It would be better if we had the privilege of playing on a Monday after a Thursday game to have one day [recovery] but we didn’t get that privilege,” he added.

“In fact, the gift we have is to play Liverpool on the Monday before, not the Monday after. So [next month] we play Liverpool on the Monday, Fenerbahce on the Thursday and Chelsea on the Sunday.

So we know that we are not going to have any kind of support on that.” However, Mourinho also insisted United “are not going to make a drama” out of their schedule.