Jose details the promotion of United's youth players

Prospects such as Tahith Chong and Angel Gomes have been working with the first team recently, following in the footsteps of Scott McTominay, who has stepped up to be a part of Mourinho's squad and has featured in 12 senior games so far this season. 

Speaking in his press conference at the Aon Training Complex on Friday, ahead of the Emirates FA Cup fifth-round tie at Huddersfield Town, the boss was asked about whether players who are performing well for the Under-18s and Under-23s will get a chance to be promoted to the senior team.

"It depends what you mean by promotion," Jose said. "If by promotion you mean that they are training regularly with us, then they have been promoted for a long time.

“Scott McTominay didn’t arrive here from the moon. Before he came to the first team, he trained with us many times last season. He came with us in pre-season and then we realised that Andreas Pereira was leaving in the summer, we decided 'okay we are not going to sign another player, we have Scott McTominay ready to step up'." 

Saturday's FA Cup tie against the Terriers at the John Smith's Stadium could present another opportunity for the youngsters to be a part of the first team, after Gomes appeared as a substitute against Yeovil Town in the last round. 

"Maybe I will have one of the kids on the bench," the boss said. "The objective of not having a squad that is too big is exactly to be open for this. For example, this week we didn't have a few players because of injuries and small things that I wanted to protect. 

"All these kids, they trained with us. Not today (Friday) because they [the Under-23s] play today, but yesterday and before yesterday they trained with us."