Mourinho hopes to face Wenger again

Reuters

Manchester United manager Jose Mourinho hopes he gets the chance to face Arsene Wenger again after the outgoing Arsenal manager’s final visit to Old Trafford as Gunners’ boss ended in a 2-1 defeat on Sunday.

Wenger was greeted by former United boss Alex Ferguson and Mourinho before kick-off and even presented with a glass memento. However, Wenger was left empty-handed when it came to points as defeat left sixth-placed Arsenal mathematically out of the race for a top-four finish.

Marouane Fellaini rose highest to flick home the winner in stoppage time after Henrikh Mkhitaryan’s second-half strike against his former club had cancelled out Paul Pogba’s early opener.

“I hope I play against him again,” said Mourinho, who has a history of spats with Wenger, most famously describing the Frenchman as a “specialist in failure” for his inability to win the Premier League since 2003/04.

“I hope that can happen again. If not in the Premier League, who knows (where) we can have a big match somewhere?”

United has now sealed its place in the Champions League next season and moved closer to its target of finishing at least second best to champion Manchester City by opening a five-point gap on Liverpool.

“OK progress at many levels, but (it’s) not enough to be first instead of second and not enough to win the Champions League instead of the Europa League,” added Mourinho. “It’s enough to finish second, to be stable, to win some trophies, to reach some finals, but we need more.”

Ferguson told the United website ahead of the game that his clashes for many years with Wenger’s strongest Arsenal sides over a decade ago “made the Premier League.”

But it was a sign of how far Arsenal has fallen that Wenger made eight changes from the side that drew 1-1 with Atletico Madrid in the first leg of their Europa League semi-final on Thursday as he had already given up hope of a top-four finish.

“It goes to show you, once you are not a danger any more, people love you,” said Wenger on his fond farewell from the United fans.

“I am thankful to Manchester United. They had a nice gesture before the game, it was the first time I got a trophy before the game. It was very classy from them. I want to have a glass of wine now with Sir Alex because he has always good wine.”

Romelu Lukaku picked out Alexis Sanchez at the back post and after his header was deflected onto his own post by Hector Bellerin, Pogba had the simple task of tapping into an unguarded net.

The host soon also lost its lead when Mkhitaryan pounced on some slack United defending to fire across De Gea into the bottom corner.