Paul Pogba flourishes without Wayne Rooney as United thump Leicester but isn't happy

With all the attention on Wayne Rooney this weekend, it was almost forgotten that the most expensive player in the world had been back in England for a couple of months and was yet to turn in a really convincing performance.

Of course nobody was panicking, but when Paul Pogba is at his best, he plays with a swagger, a visible confidence that he's worth every penny of that eye-watering £89.3 million transfer fee. That had only been seen in flashes so far, but it was much more present in Manchester United's 4-1 win over Leicester on Saturday.

But against Leicester, he was more substantial than that, rarely trying to force the issue and merely controlling the game with careful brilliance. His one concession to the spectacular was a dipping, swerving shot in the first half that was just kept out by Leicester's overwhelmed replacement keeper Ron-Robert Zieler, in for the injured Kasper Schmeichel. This was a showing of calm authority: perhaps not the player many United fans thought they were getting but still a very welcome one.

He's the modern footballer you'd design in a lab -- skilful, strong and smart, and his only weakness is really that he doesn't display all of his outrageous gifts often enough. There was still the odd moment (he gave the ball away dangerously in the second half, a concession that could have been punished further), but this was a mature showing, one which Mourinho must have more of.



Not that Mourinho was excessively impressed.

"I thought he was OK against Southampton and Hull," Mourinho shrugged when asked if he thought that was Pogba's best performance for United.

But in seeking to play down Pogba's excellence, he perhaps revealed something about the way this season at Old Trafford could go.

"When the team plays well, he plays well," Mourinho said. "When the team plays better, he plays better. We want more from him and from the team. The last thing the team achieves is consistency -- so he has to be more consistent, like the team."

Perhaps it is the other way around. Pogba playing well means United playing well, and more consistency from him means more consistency from them. It's probably not a coincidence that Pogba's best performance of the season was also United's.

How much of this was down to Rooney's absence? Perhaps plenty, as Pogba was definitely afforded more space to do his work, rather than having to trip over an often ponderous Rooney as he dropped deeper and deeper looking for the ball.