Strange but true: a serial football manager is appointed to a club where, after two years, an absentee owner who lives in the United States and a rugby enthusiast investment banker feel they know better than him.

In November 2018, Mourinho and Martial take the field at Juventus Stadium.

Those at Manchester United should be concerned that Jose Mourinho’s words this week are identical to what he stated four and a half years ago.

“There are still people at that club and when I say people, I say some players, but also some other people who aren’t players, they’re still there and after two months with these people, you are never going to do it,” Mourinho stated in an interview with Obi One.

Mourinho told L’Equipe in May 2019: “The problems are there, you can say these are the players, the organization, the ambition.”

Mourinho coached Victor Lindelof, Diogo Dalot, Luke Shaw, Scott McTominay, Marcus Rashford, and Anthony Martial of the current Manchester United squad.

Mourinho chuckled at the memory of an agent of a United player accusing him of bullying his client by substituting him at halftime during a conversation with his former Chelsea enforcer John Obi Mikel. Shaw is thought to be that player.

Shaw got off to a bad start with Mourinho when he was a teenager at Southampton and contacted him about a possible move to his boyhood club Chelsea. Mourinho questioned Shaw’s salary demands once he joined United, and the feud lasted for the rest of their two-and-a-half year working relationship.

Mourinho was never going to treat Shaw like a child, who was once late to training because his mother had overslept and did not wake him. During a gym session, a United player observed a fitness instructor outsprinting Shaw and began filming it before sending the video to Mourinho over WhatsApp.

Shaw has developed into the best left-back in the country, if not the world. “He is a man now,” Mourinho said last season to a confidant.

It is safe to presume that one of the “people still there” mentioned by Mourinho is Martial. It is also realistic to assume that this will be Martial’s final season at United, given his one-year contract extension is set to expire.

Shaw was immature during his early years at United.

Earlier this month, the United social media staff chose not to wish Martial a happy birthday on Twitter. They did it on Instagram, where the top remark reads, “The comment’s [sic] gonna be wild.”

Mourinho hinted at a Martial departure in July 2018, but Joel Glazer and Ed Woodward shut it down. During that pre-season trip of the United States, there was a lot of briefing and counter-briefing. It continued at Carrington on transfer deadline day.

To be fair to Martial, when the going got rough in Mourinho’s last months, he got going and went on a career-high six-goal streak in seven games. Mourinho was a big fan of Martial on the sidelines at Stamford Bridge, when he scored two goals against Chelsea in October 2018.

Under Mourinho, Martial scored more goals than Ole Gunnar Solskjaer. The most important statistic is that it took 44 days between Martial’s agent, Philippe Lamboley, declaring “I am very pessimistic about a positive outcome of the discussions” and Martial signing a five-and-a-half-year contract. Mourinho was fired a day after Lamboley’s outburst.

Under Mourinho, Martial wanted to leave.

In June 2018, Lamboley told RMC Sport, “Anthony wants to leave.” United’s pants were tugged down by Lamboley and Martial, who has scored 46 goals for the club since Mourinho’s dismissal five years ago today.

Later, Mourinho complained that Glazer refused to sell Martial because he was his favorite player. Martial had resale value in 2018, and he is set to be released at the age of 28.

The second side of the French connection, Paul Pogba, was freed 18 months ago. That is United’s punishment for caving to the players and siding with them over the manager.

If the Ineos Group has done their homework, they will consider how United knowingly allowed players and agents to undercut their management. Erik ten Hag eliminated Cristiano Ronaldo, and any other player – David de Gea, Jadon Sancho – is insignificant.

Ronaldo was forced to leave after claiming he had no regard for Ten Hag.

The United fans are well aware of this. They booed a group of players rather than the manager as they skulked down the tunnel following the drab loss at Bournemouth 10 days ago. Some praised Marcus Rashford’s substitution, while others booed him when he came on against Chelsea a week ago.

Dwaine Maynard, Rashford’s brother and agent, trolled Mourinho on Instagram after Rashford’s goals sealed a 2-1 United victory over Mourinho’s Tottenham in December 2019. Under Mourinho, Rashford won two of United’s four major trophies and was promoted to the No.10 position.

As guilty as Ten Hag has been in a season in which United has lost more games than it has won, the idea of keeping him in place ensures that certain players do not survive another manager. Some have downed tools, sat tight, and outlasted past regimes in that dressing room, both permanent and interim.

But Glazer and Woodward are no longer in charge.