JOSE MOURINHO claims that Manchester United still have players that he wanted to get rid of “five or six years ago”.

Mourinho, 61, was sacked by by the Red Devils in December 2018 following a dismal start to the season.

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As he awaits his next opportunity, the Portuguese reminisced over his time at Old Trafford while speaking to the Telegraph.

The former Chelsea boss believes that current United manager Erik ten Hag has received better support than he ever got from Ed Woodward, who left his position as executive vice chairman in February 2022.

“My relationship with [former chief executive] Ed Woodward was good,” Mourinho said.

“Good as in the personal point of view. Even now we send an SMS. But from a professional point of view it was not the best.

“I am who I am. I am a football man. Ed comes from a different background and what Ten Hag has in his time at Manchester United I didn’t have.

“I didn’t have that level of support. I didn’t have that level of trust. So I left sad, because I felt I was in the beginning of the process.

“In some moments, I felt if they trusted me and believed in my experience things could be different.”

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Mourinho then admitted that there are STILL players at Old Trafford to this day that he wanted rid of during his tenure.

He went on: “There are still a couple of players still there I didn’t want five or six years ago.

“I think they represent a little bit what I consider not the best professional profile to a club of a certain dimension.

“But I did my job there. Time always tells the truth. I would love Manchester United to succeed.”

The Red Devils’ first team squad features six players that played for Mourinho during his final season at Old Trafford; Marcus Rashford, Anthony Martial, Luke Shaw, Diogo Dalot, Victor Lindelof and Scott McTominay.

Of these stars, Martial is set to leave this summer when his contract expires.

Rashford, meanwhile, penned a new five-year deal last summer, while Shaw and Dalot are regulars when fit.

McTominay has contributed with seven Prem goals and a further three in all competitions this season – while Lindelof has played 19 times in the league.

While Mourinho had more stars that he wanted rid of, the former United boss did brutally freeze out one high-profile player during his tenure.

Bastian Schweinsteiger recently told Gary Neville of how he was made to train with Man Utd’s Under-16 team following Mourinho’s 2016 arrival at the club.

The German had joined the previous year under Louis van Gaal, but fell out of favour as soon as Mourinho walked through the doors.

‘No warning, nothing’

He told Sky Bet’s The Overlap: “When I arrived on the first day, I trained with Zlatan Ibrahimovic and thought it was great, a player who has the vision and is amazing to play with.

“The next day, on my birthday, when I walked into Carrington, John Murtough was there and said that I wasn’t allowed to walk into the dressing room, the coach had said so.

“No warning, nothing. I don’t know. Someone could have told me there or explained it to me in a normal way, but okay, I went to the youth dressing room and trained with the under 16s.

“Yes, completely [kicked me out of the first team dressing room], so I had to ask him [Murtough] to bring me my cleats and training gear.

“I asked him who I was training with, and he said there was the under 16 team, so I went and trained with the Under-16’s.”

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