FA Cup Final: Ten Hag Must Cheat Like Mourinho To Overcome Man City –Rooney

Former Manchester United striker, Wayne Rooney has told Erik Ten Hag to apply Jose Mourinho’s cheating tricks if he must overcome Man City in the final of the FA Cup.

Rooney says only a major “gamble” will see Ten Hag stop City from winning a possible Treble.

Pep Guardiola’s men are hoping to take a significant step closer to emulating Sir Alex Ferguson’s legendary class of 1999 against the Red Devils next weekend at Wembley.

It will be their second trophy this campaign, after they pipped Arsenal to the Premier League title.

But Rooney feels Ten Hag needs to shake things up and take a leaf out of Jose Mourinho’s book if he is to cause an upset against City.

Rooney told The Times: “I’d try something similar to a tactic José Mourinho sometimes deployed in his first spell at Chelsea, where he would get the likes of Joe Cole, Arjen Robben and Damien Duff to take up ‘half’ positions where they didn’t come all the way back and defend when Chelsea were out of possession but instead cheat a bit and wait higher up the pitch in areas from which they could counterattack as soon as Chelsea won the ball back.

“We always found it difficult to play against. When you were attacking, you were thinking, ‘Where’s Robben? Where’s Cole? Who’s staying back? What’s the communication like to make sure we’re dealing with those players?’

“United could do similar using Marcus Rashford and Anthony Martial: defend with eight players and have those two waiting in counterattack positions. That would ask City different questions: should John Stones still come into the midfield or would it leave that side of the pitch open for Rashford to run into? Should Kyle Walker go high or would this open up space?