What is happening with Paul Pogba at Manchester United?

The £89 million midfielder has been substituted in United’s two previous matches - defeats to Tottenham and Newcastle.

And now, he will miss their FA Cup fifth-round tie against Huddersfield due to a reported illness.

The illness couldn’t have come at a worse time for the former Juventus star with reports suggesting that Pogba is unhappy with Jose Mourinho and that he regrets joining them over Real Madrid.

On Friday, Mourinho was asked whether those reports had any truth to them and it’s fair to say the Portuguese manager didn’t take too kindly to the question.

MOURINHO'S POGBA RANT

"I think you are nice with your words because when you say a lot of speculation you should say a lot of lies," Mourinho began. "Because I accept and can speak on Paul's behalf without any kind of problem, Paul accepts he has not been playing well.

"So be objective and say what we all know in the last couple of matches: He didn't play well, period. End of story. Now it's my problem and Paul's to improve his performance level, you don't need to be a liar.

"It's easy and honest and objective to say Paul didn't play well against Newcastle but some of the guys are paid millions, don't let people read things that are not true, you are paid to read the game and explain the game. Don't say bulls**t."

And that was just a snippet of Mourinho’s rant…

But what is really happening between Pogba and Mourinho?

Well, it certainly wouldn’t be surprising if Mourinho is just trying to get the very best out of Pogba with this treatment. As the saying goes: ‘Treat them mean, keen them keen…’

We’ve seen it in the past with Mourinho dropping big players - or having reported rows with them - only for them to go and perform brilliantly for him.

JOE COLE ON MOURINHO'S MAN-MANAGEMENT

And quotes from Joe Cole have emerged that describe Mourinho’s man-management skills.

Cole played under Mourinho at Chelsea and his words could explain exactly what’s going on with Pogba right now.

“Straight away, he ‘got’ me. I mean, he cracked the whip with me a lot. And looking back, there were times when I was really mad with him, but he knew what he was doing,” Cole said, per Manchester Evening News.

“He knew how to wind me up and get a performance out of me. He knew that if he dropped me, when he brought me on for 20 minutes in the next game he was going to get 20 minutes of the best I could give.”

Is Mourinho just making Pogba hungry to impress him the next time he plays? Well, we’ll find out once the midfielder has recovered from his illness…