Luke Shaw says that his famously poor relationship with Jose Mourinho is much worse than most people realise during their spell together at Manchester United.
While Mourinho was in charge at Old Trafford he publicly criticised Shaw a number of times, pulling no punches as he slammed the full-back’s ‘football brain’ and commitment in training sessions.
The Portuguese brought up Shaw’s name after England’s win over Czech Republic at Euro 2020 as well, criticising his deliver from corner kicks.
‘The negative thing I would say is once more they were very poor on attacking corners,’ Mourinho explained on talkSPORT after the 1-0 win.
‘The service was dramatically bad. They have so many good players to attack corners. The crosses are not passing the first man.
‘Luke Shaw, in my opinion, very good tonight but very poor on the corner. [Kalvin] Phillips, the same.
Shaw finds the continued criticism strange and feels his former manager has an unhealthy problem with him which neither he, nor his England teammates, can understand.
‘I am trying to move on but, obviously, he can’t,’ said Shaw. ‘He continuously talks about me, which I find quite strange. Even some of the lads have said: “What’s his problem?’ and, “Why does he keep talking?”
‘What he says now is nothing compared to how it used to be. I don’t think any of you realise the two or three years I had with him and how bad it was then, what it was like then.
‘I am being totally honest. I am so past it now. I have grown up a lot. The three years I had with him, I learnt a lot. I find it easy to ignore him now and even laugh about it. But it’s better just to ignore it.
‘Hopefully he can find his peace with that, finally move on and stop worrying about me. Clearly I’m in his head a lot. He clearly thinks about me a lot.’
Shaw accepts that Mourinho is working with the media during this tournament so will be expected to give his opinion and he clearly has strong opinions on the Man Utd left-back.
The 25-year-old says he tried to work his way into Mourinho’s good books in the past, but after continued failure he no longer cares.
‘His job is to comment on what he feels is right,’ said Shaw. ‘His voice is obviously very big. He likes to talk a lot about me, as everyone has seen recently. But his voice is his own. He can say what he wants. I will focus on myself.
‘It’s different with different players. He likes some, he doesn’t like others. I think I fell into the category where he didn’t like me.
‘I tried as hard as I could to get back on to his side but it never worked out, no matter what I did. There is no hiding that we didn’t get on. I think he was a brilliant manager but, you know, the past is the past. It is time to move on.’
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