Jose Mourinho, the manager of the world’s wealthiest football club, Manchester United, has announced that this year’s top televised charity extravaganza will be called “Manchester United In Need.”The forthcoming season’s pre-season holiday to America hasn’t gone too well for the liking of the formerly successful ex-manager of Porto, Chelsea, Inter Milan and Real Madrid. “My players are only just back from the World Cup and here we are in America because we have American owners, we are funded by an American car company and I made the mistake of telling the owners our strikers needed shooting practice. “Leave it to us,” they said, and here we are with our forward line being taught how to use semi-automatic rifles when they should be working out how to score more goals.”

The Formerly Special One underlined the seriousness of the situation, asking, “How are we supposed to compete with Tottenham for fourth place with this sort of interference?”

Bemoaning his club’s pre-season fixture pile up, Mourinho complained that his rivals have all had easier pre-seasons and that it’s impossible for Manchester United to win the league now that referees don’t add on an extra five minutes at the end of games any more, eight if they’re actually losing.

“Manchester United is not a wealthy club. We are financially poor. We cannot compete with oil sheikhs and Russian criminals. Our income is limited. Our pretend football kits cost only £183 for shirt, shorts and socks. I need all the television viewers to call in and pledge to buy one during Manchester United In Need. Their money will support a hopeless defender for a whole minute. Please phone or text £183 to 1-0-1-0. Please don’t make us show a film of a hopeless defender in between the funny bits on the show.”

A spokesman for the BBC, a Mr G Lineker, said he had not seen