Monday 1 May 2017 11:51, UK
Jose Mourinho bemoaned his growing injury list, but insisted he was "very happy" with his players in Manchester United's 1-1 draw at home to Swansea on Sunday.
Wayne Rooney's first-half penalty was cancelled out by Gylfi Sigurdsson's free-kick as Manchester United missed out on the chance to climb into the top four, and the manager's frustration was increased as Luke Shaw and Eric Bailly limped off injured.
They join an injury list that includes Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Marcos Rojo, Chris Smalling and Phil Jones and Mourinho refused to criticise his players after a draw at home against a team in the relegation zone.
He said: "If I analyse the performance, I will obviously find weakness, that is obvious and it is not difficult to find that.
"But I cannot do that. I cannot isolate from the context and the context is the boys gave everything they can.
"If I had more fresh players, I would change. It was easy to see Ashley Young and Jesse Lingard were above the others in terms of freshness, sharpness. It was easy to see that and it was easy to see many players in trouble.
"But we don't have others, that's the problem.
"The second half was our best period. We had control, we had chances to score the second goal and probably relax and kill the game and then they scored a beautiful free-kick.
"We lose two points, but I'm very happy with the players. Very happy. I cannot demand anything more from them.
"I am more than happy."
The game was the ninth played in April by Mourinho's side, who play the first leg of their Europa League semi-final against Celta Vigo on Thursday.
And Mourinho, who saw his side win the EFL Cup in February but lose to Chelsea in the FA Cup quarter-final, insists his players are being punished for their success.
"Imagine if we go to the FA Cup semi-finals," he added.
"We would be playing Tottenham last week, so last week when we played Burnley that game would also be a game to be played later. When? When? When would we be playing that game against Burnley?
"Until the end of the season, we are going to be playing every two or three days, so when would we be playing against Burnley? After the FA Cup final? In June? In next pre-season?
"When would we be playing this game? In the end, it was a blessing that we didn't play in the FA Cup semi-final.
"We go again to the same problem. You are punished because you are doing well."
Mourinho also threatened to play a youth team in their final Premier League match of the season on Sunday May 21, should they reach the Europa League final three days later.
"At the moment, it is hypothetical, but the Europa League final is on the Wednesday and we play against Crystal Palace on the Sunday. We play Southampton away two days [sic] before that.
"We would be playing the final in disaster consequences. Again, maybe this result is also a blessing because maybe I can bring Nicky Butt and his team to play against Crystal Palace.
"Hopefully Crystal Palace doesn't need the game to stay in the division. It would be very, very bad if they needed the points for us to play with the Under-23s."
