Manchester United manager José Mourinho has insisted that their newest defensive signing Victor Lindelöf needs "little bit of time" to settle into life at Old Trafford, after the Swede was omitted from the squad for the 4-0 win over West Ham.
Let's go step by step
There were high hopes for Lindelöf after as the 23-year-old became Mourinho's first signing of the summer, securing the defender's services for £30.7m from Benfica.
The defender showcased his talents while on the clubs pre-season tour of America, but his challenge to give away the penalty in the 1-1 draw with Real Madrid showed that he is still settling into his new surroundings.
European suspensions for Eric Bailly and Phil Jones saw him thrown in at the deep end alongside Chris Smalling in the centre of defence in the UEFA Super Cup, the defender didn't cover himself in glory in Macedonia as Real headed them out 2-1 winners.
The Premier League season got underway at Old Trafford on Sunday afternoon with the visit of The Hammers, many will be surprised to see Lindelöf's omission but Mourinho did admit that the Super Cup did come "too early" for the defender he did state that he will give him the time to settle in.
"I think Real Madrid [in the UEFA Super Cup] was too early for him," Mourinho admitted to manutd.com post-match. "He played because Jones and Bailly were both suspended."
"I've had players coming from different leagues to the Premier League," the coach conceded. "And, normally, it's not easy."
"It's different for Lukaku and Matic as they have had years and years in the Premier League," the 54-year-old stated. "I think Victor needs a little bit of time and he is going to have that time."
"Henrikh Mkhitaryan is not a defender but, last season, he needed his time too," Mourinho added. "So let's go step by step because Victor is a fantastic player."
Winning was the most important thing
Many would have expected that defeat to Madrid to have knocked United's confidence going into Sunday's clash, but The Red Devils ended up top of Premier League table at the end of the first weekend with many touting it as the best performance of the Mourinho era.
Lukaku opened the scoring in the 33rd minute on his league debut for his new club before adding a second after the break, Anthony Martial and Paul Pogba added the third and fourth late on but Mourinho failed to get too carried away and stated that winning was the "most important thing".
"Many times last season we deserved to win and we didn't," Mourinho stated post-match. "So the fact we won the match was the most important thing."
"I think the quality of our performance, based on the confidence levels, was really high," the coach affirmed. "But I am not going to say the performance was perfect because it wasn't perfect."
"We made our mistakes and have room for improvement, obviously," he admitted. "But it was a solid performance."
"We had good stability," Mourinho concluded. "And confidence levels and desire to play until the end. So good, really good."