Manchester United manager Jose Mourinho was again very business like and far from jovial in his earlier than usual press conference ahead of the Friday night encounter with Southampton at Old Trafford.
He seems very content with the signings that he has made this summer and took time to complement Eric Bailly, Zlatan and Paul Pogba in his weekly press conference.
But, as is always the case with Manchester United in the transfer window, rumours still abound about further business before September 2nd.
And experienced defender has been mooted as a possible addition and Southampton’s Jose Fonte has been the subject of much of the most recent speculation.
And Jose Mourinho was asked about Fonte in the run up to Manchester United’s game against his team Southampton. While remaining poker-faced, Mourinho did once more leave the door open for more transfer business.
“The market is open until 31 August, but I am very happy with the players I have. I keep saying that I don’t talk about players from other clubs.”
Manchester United do have a lot of quality in the centre of defence but Chris Smalling is the oldest of them at 26. Then comes Marcos Rojo (26), Daley Blind (26), Phil Jones (24) and Eric Bailly (22).
The new Manchester United manager has regularly relied on older heads in his back line with John Terry and Ricardo Carvalho crucial parts of Mourinho’s greatest teams.
So it remains to be seen whether another defender will come in. In truth, TFF thinks that Jose has been sufficiently impressed by Daley Blind and Eric Bailly to be too worried about that area of the team. With Phil Jones and Chris Smalling in reserve, the central defence looks pretty deep to us.