When Jose Mourinho was appointed as Manchester United manager in May 2016, the club had just won the FA Cup, but still decided to swing the axe on Louis van Gaal. United had finished fifth, in a season in which the Premier League was wide open, and Leicester City ultimately took the crown in the unlikeliest sporting triumph in a generation.
Just three months later, United paid £89m to bring Paul Pogba back to the club from Juventus. Having left Old Trafford as a free agent four years earlier, Pogba returned as the most expensive footballer in the world, a prized asset stripped away from Juventus at the peak of his powers. He was back, he was world-class, and he was ready to run the midfield for the next decade.
Mourinho was instrumental in the deal; he had seemingly declared his interest in the Frenchman at his first press conference, when he claimed he wanted four players, and Pogba arrived alongside Zlatan Ibrahimovic as the Portuguese’s bid to build a dynasty in the mould of Sir Alex Ferguson began.
Things, however, quickly unravelled as a power struggle between the two men came to define their time working together...