Jose Mourinho has admitted he apologised to Henrik Mkhitaryan during Manchester United’s FA Cup win over Derby, the Express reports.

Mkhitaryan, who has fallen out of favour under Mourinho, was granted a rare start at Old Trafford in the third round.

However, the Armenian was substituted at half-time and replaced by Romelu Lukaku, who grabbed the second goal in a 2-0 victory.

Mourinho admitted he didn’t do the right thing and explained he spoke to Mkhitaryan in the dressing room.

“[It was] unfair [to take Mkhitaryan off] and I told him that at half-time,” Mourinho said.

“I didn’t like what I did. He didn’t deserve it, he was playing well, he wasn’t playing bad.

He had a couple of missed passes but he was playing well and giving a good dynamic to the team.

“My feeling was just that Rashford is not going to score a goal and because of that I’m not going to lose time and I’m going to play Romelu [Lukaku] so then I had to sacrifice a player.

“Micki was the one that I sacrificed but it’s something that I don’t normally do but I did at half-time and apologised to him in front of other people because he didn’t deserve it.”