Jose Mourinho confirmed Anthony Martial will start for the club next season, along with Juan Mata and Alexis Sanchez.
The French forward didn’t make Didier Deschamps’ squad for their World Cup-winning campaign after racking up just 18 Premier League starts in 2017/18.
It was thought that Martial would be among the players departing the club this summer after his agent confirmed the player wasn’t happy at Old Trafford, as per The42, but now it looks like the former AS Monaco forward will be wearing the Red shirt for at least another year.
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Fans were concerned about Martial leaving due to his ability and potential and they will be relieved to hear Mourinho’s plans to start him when the new season begins.
Speaking to the press on Wednesday, Mourinho said: “It will be important for us to work with (Juan) Mata, Alexis, Martial which we think will be the players to have in attack for the start of the season. No (Romelu) Lukaku, no (Jesse) Lingard, no (Marcus) Rashford, so if Alexis isn’t working with us for 10/15 days it will be very bad.”
This grants Martial a great opportunity to prove himself under Mourinho. If he scores some important goals in Lukaku’s absence, Mourinho needs to show more faith in the Frenchman. His development may have stalled, but a lot of that may well be down to confidence.
If the manager doesn’t fancy a player and he senses that, you’re not going to get 100% out of him.
That said, I think Martial should have more drive to prove critics wrong rather than stroll around the pitch sulking. Mourinho hasn’t got time for babies.