'Another s*** goal' - Jose Mourinho takes aim at his own defenders, Burnley and Manchester City

Jose Mourinho suggested Manchester City are a big team, but not a big club

Kevin Palmer

Jose Mourinho urged the Manchester United board to spend more money in the transfer market in a bid to combat Manchester City's domination of the Premier League, as he aimed some pointed verbal barbs at his local rivals.

United could fall 15 points behind Premier League leaders Manchester City if their rivals win at Newcastle on Wednesday following a 2-2 draw with Burnley at Old Trafford on St Stephen's Day.

It might even have been worse for Mourinho's men had Jesse Lingard not come off the bench to score twice, including a stoppage-time equaliser, after the visitors had opened up a 2-0 lead.

Yet even though Mourinho has been handed huge sums of money to sign players like Paul Pogba (£89m) and Romelu Lukaku £75m), he suggests more cash needs to be spent if United want to keep pace with their neighbours.

Responding to a question that such a gap might be unacceptable for a club of United's stature, Mourinho said in his press conference: "One thing is a big club and another thing is a big football team. They are two different things.

"We are in the second year of trying to rebuild a football team that is not one of the best teams in the world. Manchester City buy full-backs for the price of strikers. When you speak about big football clubs, you are speaking about the history of the club."

When it was pointed out United have spent heavily - roughly £286million - since Mourinho took charge in 2016, the Portuguese said: "OK, (but) it is not enough. The price for the big clubs is different than for the other clubs.

"The big historical clubs, they are normally punished in the market because of their history."

Mourinho insisted bad luck was the primary reason why his side drew 2-2 against Leicester and followed that up with another draw against Burnley at Old Trafford, as he insisted both games should have been won, as he was asked if United were going through a difficult patch.

"Why? Because we deserve to win matches," he asked. "Because the opponent went to our goal twice and they score twice? The quality of our play, the risk that we took today and also against Leicester, the team that deserved to win both matches is us.

"We should have won, yes. I take satisfaction by the way the team played, by the way the team reacted, to try to recover from 2-0 down. The boys they fought against the 2-0 at half-time, so nothing at all negative to say about my players. I praise their spirit, their reaction, the way they accept all the risks we took in the second half.

"After being unhappy with the goals conceded in Saturday's 2-2 draw with Leicester, he said such defending should be described with a word beginning with S. He left the actual word to the imagination of those present.

"Another 's' goal. I don't need to say the other letters of the word," he added. "That is what we are having now, lots of 's' goals against so that has an impact in the game."