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Jose Mourinho's take on youth development will be an interesting topic when the new United boss is officially unveiled at a press conference next month.

He has, rightly or wrongly, infamously acquired a reputation for viewing youth development as low on his priorities and critics have cited his history at Chelsea of not promoting that many players to the first team choosing instead to farm out hordes of kids to other clubs.

But when Mourinho returned to Stamford Bridge in 2013 after spells away at Inter Milan and Chelsea he was keen to get an update on how youth development had progressed in England during his time away.

“I'm curious to see how youth football in England is now structured, and I'll have to smell it,” he said at the time.

“I need to understand how the competition is working because, for example, in Spain my kid (José Mario, who has since joined Fulham), even when he was only 10, was playing in a championship of 16 teams, so 30 official matches in the league all against the best teams in Madrid.

“Those kids of 10 played international tournaments in the summer, at Christmas, at Easter, at Carneval (before Lent). I think there were five international tournaments to play during the season, so he was playing matches, matches, matches. They'd be at them for a week and would play against Americans, against Italians, against Brazilians.

“It's unbelievable the amount of matches they play. In the region of Madrid they also have the selection of the best local players and they have training sessions with the best kids of every competition organised by the federation.

“And we are talking about kids of 10 years old. So, for me, what we call the 'competitive calendar' is very, very important. In my time in England before, it was not like that.

“Now I'm not sure. I've seen the under-21s (development squad) have a real calendar now. They will have their own league and the FA Youth Cup, around 50 matches. It was not like this in my previous time here, so I'm very curious how is the competition now in England. I'm curious to read the situation. The only thing I really need to look at is the competition.”

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It is doubtful he will have been that impressed in the time since coming back to England.

United's Under 21s are one of the most successful teams in the country, winning the league three times in the last four years.

But any Red managing to play in all of United's Under 21 fixtures last season would only have amassed a total of 27 games with Manchester Senior Cup and Lancashire Senior Cup games on top of the league schedule.

Marcus Rashford, Cameron Borthwick-Jackson and Tim Fosu-Mensah did at least have enough competition in the reserves to prove to then boss Louis van Gaal they were worthy of a step up to the first team.

Last season there was talk of yet another revamp of the reserve league but nothing has yet been announced.

United, however, are undergoing a huge overhaul on their youth development side with Head of Academy Nicky Butt driving the new look system.

It will be interesting to see what Mourinho's views on the youth system now are.