Roma coach Jose Mourinho has enjoyed a new swipe at Manchester United over their trophy record since he left.
Mourinho says Erik ten Hag and his other Old Trafford successors are “no longer expected to lift trophies”.
Serial winner Mourinho was the last manager to win silverware at United, securing three trophies – the Community Shield, the League Cup and the Europa League – during the 2016-17 campaign.
Ahead of what will be his fifth European final on Thursday, where his Roma side take on Feyenoord in the Europa Conference League showpiece in Albania, Mourinho was asked if critics had been too quick to write him and 62-year-old Real Madrid coach Carlo Ancelotti off too quickly.
Mourinho couldn’t resist taking a poke at the Red Devils, saying: “I believe that the problem with Carlo Ancelotti was that when you coach Everton you are not about to win the Champions League.
“And with me, you know, people they saw me taking up jobs where they thought that I could win trophies but they were not jobs where we were expected to lift trophies.
“But when you have such a winning career on a cyclical basis so to speak, you can expect that, people can say that. Personally I’m not worried about this [being replaced by younger coaches]. I do not think and focus on the generations, I focus on quality.”
He continued: “It’s a matter of quality, motivation, passion. Without passion you are finished. Without pressure in the build-up to big games you are finished. I know very well myself, I know very well Carlito as well, but there are more examples that we could make.
“But we are the ones who will call it when we want to stop, and I’m afraid people will have to wait a long time before I say that it’s over!”
