Marcus Rashford has revealed that former Manchester United manager Jose Mourinho helped him become less "angry all the time."

Rashford, 27, has admitted he would criticise himself harshly whenever he failed to deliver a flawless performance, regardless of the result. Portuguese legend Mourinho "didn't care" about how his side secured victory though - and that relaxed approach profoundly influenced the English forward.

Rashford, currently on a season-long loan spell at Barcelona, was talking to Gary Lineker and Micah Richards on The Rest Is Football podcast. When Lineker enquired which coaches at United had the most significant impact on him, Rashford mentioned Louis Van Gaal, Mourinho and Ole Gunnar Solskjaer.

Rashford explored what distinguished all three and explained how it was Mourinho, who led the club between 2016 and 2018, whose distinctive methods caught him off guard the most. "Yeah, they're different, but [that's] because we've had so many different managers," Rashford said, referring to the 10 managers United have had since 2013.

"It's so hard, it's impossible for me to compare the managers, but when you're a developing player, like at a young age, you learn stuff that you've never... no one's ever taught you that before.

"So like up until Jose, I'd never had a manager that was so fixated on winning before. Van Gaal wasn't fixated on winning... he was fixated on winning, but he wanted to play a beautiful style of football. Jose don't care. Do you know what I mean?

"As long as you win, of course, if you could choose, he'd want you to play well. But if you win, you win. You move on to the next game."

Explaining how Mourinho's methods proved a welcome shift for him, he continued: "He had this attitude. In the beginning, it was confusing for me because all the way through my development at United, it was about playing a certain style of, like winning a certain way. So in the beginning, I was angry all the time, like we've not played well today, we've won.

"But because we've won and he's a manager that is just a winner, he doesn't bring up the points that you know was missing from that last game because we've won. But when we lose, he brings up the points then. But after like six months, I just learned to respect it and then I started to reap the rewards from him as a coach."

Following months of speculation, Rashford eventually left United, the club he joined at seven years old, for Aston Villa at the beginning of the year. After netting four times under Unai Emery, he chose to move to the La Liga champions this summer.

United manager Ruben Amorim is now presiding over another fresh chapter at Old Trafford. His side finished 15th last campaign and suffered a costly defeat in the Europa League Final against Tottenham Hotspur. When pressed to identify what's gone awry at his former club, Rashford maintains the Red Devils have deserted the "principles" established by their ex-legendary boss Sir Alex Ferguson.

"When Ferguson was in charge, not only were there principles for the first team but they were for the whole academy," he said. "So you could pick players from 15 years and they'd all understand the principles of playing the Manchester United way.

"Any team that has been successful over a period of time has principles that mean that any coach or player that comes in has to align to or add to the principles. At times, United were hungry to win but it was reactionary. If your direction is always changing, you can't expect to win the league." (Manchester Evening News)

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