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Mourinho keen to help Bailly settlle
Manchester United manager Jose Mourinho says new signing Eric Bailly will be given more match time during pre-season than many of his team-mates.
United signed the Ivory Coast defender at the start of June in a £30m deal from Villarreal, but Mourinho wants the 22-year-old to use the pre-season to build an on-pitch relationship with his new team-mates.
Bailly, who impressed in United’s 2-0 victory over Wigan Athletic on Saturday, is therefore likely to feature in United's International Champions Cup matches against Borussia Dortmund and Manchester City in China next week.
"It is the first time he wears a heavy shirt like the United shirt is," the United boss told MUTV.
"He can't speak English, he just communicates with the ones that are French-spoken or Spanish so for him step by step that's the reason why I will give him more than 45 minutes.
"He's one of the players who I want to give 65, 70 [minutes] because more than others [he] needs to play, needs to feel it and needs to start communicating."
Mourinho says he will work with Bailly to help improve his game, and cited his previous working relationship with France defender Raphael Varane, who he signed for Real Madrid from Lens as an 18-year-old in 2011.
"I will give him everything to try to make him better and better and better like I did previously with other very young central defenders I had in my hands, like for example Varane,” he added.
"I will try to make him the best I can but the reality is that he showed all the potential that we saw when we decided to buy him."
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