Jose Mourinho says Eric Bailly has suffered a “really bad” knee ligament injury. Just in case you thought Manchester United’s day could not get any worse.
The Ivorian has looked United’s best defender this season but, after Sunday’s 4-0 defeat at Stamford Bridge, that is a compliment on a par with describing Kim as the most culturally significant Kardashian.
Against Chelsea the Manchester United defence looked like more than £200million of utter dross. All four of Chelsea’s goals were aided and abetted by some or all of a comedy troupe that had the Chelsea faithful rolling in the aisles.
David De Gea (£19m), Antonio Valencia (£16m), Chris Smalling (£11m), Bailly (£30m), Daley Blind (£14m), Paul Pogba (£89m) and Ander Herrera (£29m) were all guilty of some Beazer Homes League quality defending as Jose Mourinho endured a nightmare return to his former club.
We’re going to spare auxiliary left-back Marcus Rashford, as the most exciting attacker United have developed in years has no business performing the duties of an auxiliary left-back.
It was an ugly defensive performance, however. Mourinho could scarcely believe what he was seeing.
“We made incredible defensive mistakes,” said the United manager, who will hear no argument from Sky Sports pundit and former United defender Gary Neville – who likened the midfielders in red to shop dummies following Ngolo Kante’s goal.
That was the 10th goal of the French international’s career. Kante scored just once in 37 games during Leicester City’s title-winning season but was made to look like Maradona for Chelsea’s fourth.
"They are like mannequins those red shirts. He's walked through £130m of midfield. It's absolutely garbage defending." Gary Neville. A gem 😂
— Niall Ó Ceallacháin (@NAYL0R_) October 23, 2016
After the final whistle a visibly pissed off Neville ripped into Pogba and Herrera again: “That was embarrassing from the two central midfield players”. But the trouble really started after 30 seconds.
Marcos Alonso, under pressure on the left flank, lobbed a fairly innocuous ball forward. Chris Smalling (1) and Daley Blind (2) were well positioned to deal with the threat.
Inexplicably, as the ball is angled in from left to right, Smalling runs in the completely wrong direction, towards the area of the pitch that Pedro is departing. This error is compounded by the fact Blind is completely stripped for pace by the Spaniard.
De Gea, spotting the trouble ahead, gets a little carried away and tries to cut the ball out before his compatriot reaches it. He had no chance of winning that race and found himself stranded, outside his box.
Which made the finish fairly straightforward for Pedro (no goals since April) as he ran into a deserted penalty area.
Smalling stars in the clusterfuck that leads to Chelsea’s second goal also. Picking up Gary Cahill for a corner, all is going well as the ball is delivered.
Unfortunately the former Fulham man gambles on the ball reaching him as he leaves Cahill to try and intercept, only for the ball to strike Ander Herrera, bypass Smalling and find its way to the gloriously unmarked Cahill.
The Chelsea defender, gloriously unmarked, makes no mistake from six yards.
Chelsea’s third goal was easy on the eye, but still owed much to some pretty shocking defensive work by United. As Kante plays the ball to Nemanja Matic there is no great danger – United have six players back and all in the right positions.
But then Mata runs away from Eden Hazard, just as the Belgian begins to move to receive the pass from Matic. Mata does this despite Smalling pointing in the opposite direction, but does anyone pay attention to Smalling’s constant gesticulations?
The inevitable happens. Mata fails to cut out Matic’s pass and Hazard gains possession in the penalty area. Still lots to do.
Smalling helps him out by shepherding Hazard inside, onto his right foot. Granted, Hazard has too good feet, but you’d reckon De Gea would like his defenders to show opposing attackers the narrowest angle possible – not throw down the welcome mat right in front of goal 
Hazard can’t believe his luck and hammers the ball home.
By the time Kante saunters through the United “defenders” for the fourth you can see why Neville is so angry. The diminutive Frenchman receives a pass from Pedro, without Pogba or Herrera showing too much interest in tracking him.
With Pogba strolling in the direction of his international team-mate, Kante shapes to shoot left footed from the edge of the area. 
With Smalling committing himself wholeheartedly to the block, Kante switches the ball on to his right foot. Smalling is completely sold and Pogba’s leisurely pace means he cannot make a tackle. Kante is free to roll the ball across De Gea to finish the rout.
United have conceded 12 goals in nine games this season. When Chelsea won their first title under Mourinho in 2004-05, they conceded 15 goals in 38 games.
The Portuguese has an awful lot of work to do. Manchester City next in the League Cup.
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