Mourinho backs Ibrahimovic to fire Manchester United to Europa League success

Jose Mourinho believes Zlatan Ibrahimovic has extra motivation to fire Manchester United to Europa League success as the final is being staged in his native Sweden.

United meet Anderlecht in the quarter-final, first leg on Thursday with Ibrahimovic just two rounds from a title match in Stockholm next month.

Mourinho said: “It is the motivation of everyone at the club to go to the final and I believe maybe he has a little more motivation because the final is in Sweden.

“Also because he has never played in this final during such an amazing career he has had.”

Ibrahimovic has fond memories of Anderlecht, having scored five times in two games against the Brussels club in 2013-14 while at Paris Saint-Germain.

Four of those five goals came at the Constant Vandenstock Stadium and Mourinho is hoping for a similar performance in the last eight tie.

“I think it is part of history, he scores goals everywhere and probably does not even remember that,” Mourinho told reporters.

“But we hope he can deliver again. He has a good feeling with this stadium, too. For example, when we played Saint-Etienne, everyone was speaking about his record against them as a Paris Saint-Germain player, and then he scored again. Let’s see if he can do it again.”