Early team news for United v Everton

Jose Mourinho will field the strongest side he can in Tuesday's home match against Everton - and in the remaining Premier League games while a top-four finish is still achievable.

Despite being held 0-0 by West Bromwich Albion this weekend, the Reds did not lose any ground on rivals Arsenal and Manchester City in the race for a Champions League place as those two sides drew 2-2 when they met on Sunday.

"Against Everton, we’ll try to play our best team and try to win the match," said Mourinho after Saturday's stalemate with West Brom. "After Everton, we go to Sunderland with the same perspective. After Sunderland, comes the Europa League and then I don’t know.

"It’s then possible you see me play in the Premier League with a team where I’m going to protect the players I consider fundamental for the Europa League. But only if the results in the next matches put us in the situation where mathematically it becomes almost impossible to do it [finish in the top four].

"I go with mathematics. Until it’s mathematically impossible, we keep trying and, because this week is a week without the Europa League, we have nothing to think about Europe so this week is easy from the focus point of view.

"We have to play Everton and Sunderland and these two matches are where we have to go for them. We’re thinking about the Premier League and nothing else. After the match against Sunderland, we have Anderlecht. The quarter-finals of the Europa League are very important for us."

Mourinho has hinted Zlatan Ibrahimovic may play against the Toffees on Tuesday night after completing his suspension but he admits there is no guarantee the United striker would have broken the duck against the Baggies.

"We had matches here with Zlatan where we drew," recalled the manager. "He missed a penalty in the game against Bournemouth and missed chances like other people did too. 

"I cannot say now that if Zlatan and Juan Mata had played on Saturday, we would have won the game. I cannot say that at all. What I can say is Jones and Smalling wouldn’t play better than Bailly and Rojo did and Pogba and Herrera couldn’t play better than what Fellaini and Carrick did."

Paul Pogba was among a group of United players training on the Old Trafford pitch following the West Brom match but Mourinho could not confirm if the Frenchman would face Everton.

"I don’t know about Pogba," he said. "I think Mata is out for a long time, Jones and Smalling for a long time, but I cannot say on Pogba. I cannot say he is ready for Tuesday because I don’t know. I don’t think he is such a long-term injury like the others."