Manchester United's Mourinho deserves 'The Special One' name, says Pogba

Last month, Jose Mourinho declared that the goalkeeper will still be at Manchester United when pre-season kicks off later on this summer.

One of few to really impress during Louis van Gaal's underwhelming final campaign at Old Trafford, the following season went awry for the defender.

Smalling returned from his latest setback to feature in six of United's last seven matches, only sitting out the dead rubber against Crystal Palace days before helping the team to Europa League glory.

"But the more I trained the better it got". "Sometimes he does some extreme things".

Smalling chose his words carefully to make sure he did not say anything that could be construed as direct criticism of Mourinho but the centre-half said it was not true, contrary to what his manager had implicitly stated, that he was reluctant to play unless he felt 100% fit.

"I think in the Chelsea game I proved that I can play with the (pain-killing) injections", said Smalling, who has also spent time on the sidelines with a knee injury this season. We had never trained it before but it worked out well [United won 2-0].

But the player was happy enough with his own game and feels the club's success in winning three trophies vindicated his move. "He deserves his name".

"Pereira feels the different type of football he played with over at Granada was hard to adjust to but that "... it's a good challenge for me and I'm handling it as well.".

The Spanish side will not be able to sign any new players until January 1st 2018, meaning that they'll likely need to hold on to every available talent in the interim.

"I think he knows my character, he knows what type of player I am and that's not changed".

Pogba will be in action for France's World Cup qualifier against Sweden on Friday and the following friendly against England on Tuesday.