What is Marcus Rashford's best position?

Our no.10 has played both as a centre-forward and on the left flank in a three-pronged attack throughout his Reds career so far.  

Rashford occupied a striking role in a 3-5-2 formation for England during the recent international break and played a starring role for Gareth Southgate’s side, scoring in their games against Spain and Switzerland.

The 20-year-old will sit out Saturday’s Premier League clash at Watford, as he begins a three-match ban following his red card at Burnley.

But Mourinho was asked for his thoughts on where he believes Rashford is most effective during the pre-match press conference.

“I think his position is in relation to the way his team plays,” the boss explained. “So I think in the case of the national team, they play normally with five at the back and two players in attack. I think that’s his position.

“He cannot be a wing-back in the system of five – he cannot replace Luke Shaw, Kieran Trippier or Danny Rose at all. He must play centrally in that system.

Jose went on: “To be in a system of four, to be a winger, it takes him a little bit out of his positions, but the way Manchester United plays is with three attacking players.

“When we play with three up top – because sometimes we also play with two - our three attacking players are not wingers. They’re not wide or open all the time. They have the freedom to come and play in between positions, and any one of the three positions is a good position for him.”

‘THE PLAN IS MINUTES’

The boss also provided a rousing statement, highlighting Rashford’s importance to United during his Friday press conference.

Armed with statistics, he illustrated just how much the forward has played during his two-year tenure so far, in response to reports suggesting Marcus should leave Old Trafford in search of more regular first-team football.

Opta has since released data which backs up the manager's comments...

126 - No player has played more competitive matches for a Premier League club than Marcus Rashford (126) since his debut in February 2016. Proof. pic.twitter.com/hrNDwGsv3t

— OptaJoe (@OptaJoe) 14 September 2018

When asked about his plan for Rashford, Jose held up his document which detailed Marcus’s appearance statistics and said: “The plan for me is here. This is my plan.

"There is no other plan. My plan is always training well, training in a very specific way, train like the attacking players in separate plans for specific things in games, train collectively as a group from a tactical point of view in the team and the way the team plays.

“The most important part of the plan is this [pointing to the document]. This is the plan. The plan is minutes.”