Mourinho says Mata behaved amazingly well, but without happiness

We've got some new quotes from Jose Mourinho, talking about Juan Mata and the decision to let him leave for Manchester United. Mourinho had the following to say about leaving Mata out of the team most weeks, via Sky Sports:

"It's difficult for me to leave him out of the team. It's difficult for me to decide that Oscar is going to be my number 10 and that I'm going to build my team around that decision."

"And it's difficult for him to accept the situation. He's a player with status."

"He was behaving amazingly well, an example for the other boys to follow, but no happiness. With that status, it's difficult."

After discussing Mata's happiness, Mourinho moved on to the decision to sell to Manchester United:

"If a similar situation happens, and instead of Man United, it's Arsenal or Manchester City or Tottenham or Liverpool, we would do the same. If the offer was the same and Juan desired to go, it would be the same."

I'm not sure I fully believe that we'd have willingly sold to either Arsenal or Manchester City during the middle of the season, but as we sold to a mid-table side, I suppose we'll just never know.

At the end of the day, Juan Mata was just struggling to do the things required to earn minutes under Jose Mourinho, and was not getting on the pitch because of it. It's disappointing that the situation deteriorated to the point that Mata wanted to leave, but it did, and now we move on.

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