Almunia's injury was not serious. He had sprained a finger on his right hand and would be sidelined for around two weeks, ruling him out of the upcoming match against Brighton.
Because the players had exhausted themselves against Reading, Mourinho gave the regular starters a day off, although the substitutes were still required to train.
In reality, apart from Juninho, who had an urgent personal matter to attend to, every player returned to Newton Heath.
Olić and Čech were particularly determined, following their outstanding performances with their usual extra training.
Mourinho was delighted by the atmosphere within the squad and felt even more confident about the fixtures ahead.
On September 29, in the twelfth round of League Two, New Manchester United hosted Brighton at the City Ground.
After the exhausting battle against Reading, the Red Rebels looked short of energy.
Curtis returned to the starting lineup, while Mourinho selected Alou Diarra in place of Essien and Wright-Phillips ahead of Hleb.
Even so, New Manchester United lacked their usual intensity.
Brighton performed well away from home and played proactively throughout the match.
They created several dangerous chances and came close to scoring on more than one occasion.
However, Čech continued where he had left off against Reading.
He remained composed from beginning to end and gave Brighton no way through.
New Manchester United eventually won 1-0.
Drogba scored the decisive goal in the second half, assisted by Palacio, who had replaced Malouda.
The post-match statistics reflected the balance of play.
New Manchester United had only 7 shots, with 2 on target, and scored once.
Brighton, meanwhile, attempted 14 shots and put 6 on target without finding the net.
Most notably, during a corner, Kitson directed a close-range header toward goal, only for Čech to produce an almost unbelievable save.
Čech was once again named Man of the Match.
Thanks to his exceptional performances in the two fixtures, he was also shortlisted among the three leading candidates for Player of the Month, a rare achievement for a goalkeeper.
Some commentators even claimed that Čech had single-handedly saved New Manchester United.
With 12 consecutive league victories from the beginning of the season, New Manchester United had undoubtedly established themselves as one of the strongest candidates for the League Two title.
Their main rivals appeared to be Brentford, whose extraordinary early-season form had also produced 12 straight victories.
Meanwhile, New Manchester United had received a bye in the opening round of the Northern Section of the Football League Trophy and advanced directly to the second round.
Their opponents were League One side Shrewsbury Town, a familiar rival.
The match was scheduled for October 2, with New Manchester United playing away.
Mourinho did not place great importance on the competition and fielded a heavily rotated side.
Olić started up front, with Ribéry and Palacio on the wings.
De Rossi, Senna, and Alou Diarra formed the midfield.
The back four, from left to right, consisted of Evra, Hangeland, Chiellini, and Bosingwa.
David Green made his first start of the season in goal.
Despite taking a reserve side to Shrewsbury, Mourinho remained confident of victory.
He described the match as a test of whether those players were ready to represent New Manchester United in the league.
Anyone who performed well would be considered for the squad travelling to face Bristol City on October 6.
That gave the players an enormous incentive.
Chiellini was especially determined.
His disastrous performance against Reading had attracted considerable criticism, but Mourinho had continued to trust him and rewarded him with another start.
The young defender was desperate to prove himself.
Chiellini performed excellently.
He appeared to have recovered from the disappointment of the previous match and played with tremendous energy.
Whether dealing with aerial balls or passes along the ground, he completed his defensive duties successfully.
He also scored with a header from a set piece.
Olić, who started in place of Drogba, was as relentless as ever.
He ran tirelessly throughout the match and looked far more confident than before.
He assisted Ribéry in the first half and De Rossi in the second.
Later, Palacio won a penalty.
Olić's teammates allowed him to take it, and he accepted without hesitation before converting confidently.
The final score of 5-1 showed Shrewsbury, who had believed they could defeat New Manchester United, just how large the gap between the two sides had become.
The previous season, Shrewsbury had held the Red Rebels to a 1-1 draw at home.
Now New Manchester United looked overwhelmingly powerful in the eyes of their players.
After advancing to the Northern Section quarter-finals of the Football League Trophy, New Manchester United were drawn against League One side Lincoln City.
The tie was scheduled for November 3.
Lincoln were enjoying a fairly ordinary League One campaign.
They had been eliminated in the first round of the League Cup but had now reached the quarter-finals of the Football League Trophy.
...
The day after New Manchester United's victory over Shrewsbury, the FA finally issued a response to the club's earlier complaint.
Several days before, the chairman of the FA Referees' Committee had already apologised directly to New Manchester United.
He acknowledged that several decisions during the match against Reading had been highly controversial, especially the two penalties, and admitted that Mourinho's emotional reaction was understandable.
However, despite the referee's numerous obvious errors, the FA had delayed announcing any formal action.
Now they finally declared that referee training and management would be strengthened.
At the same time, they rejected calls to introduce external technology to assist officials, even arguing that football's unpredictability and human errors were part of its beauty.
During an interview, the FA chairman mentioned New Manchester United specifically.
He suggested that the referee's mistakes had ignited the players' fighting spirit, inspired their remarkable comeback, and helped forge the team's unbreakable resolve.
The public widely regarded those remarks as an excuse for the FA's unwillingness to take meaningful action.
Regardless, the season had to continue.
Thanks to New Manchester United's outstanding performances in September, Mourinho was named Manager of the Month.
When he received the traditional bottle of champagne, everyone at the club became nervous.
There was a long-standing superstition that a team would lose immediately after its manager received the monthly award.
Mourinho did not believe in curses.
Away to Bristol City, Drogba produced an excellent performance and scored twice, helping New Manchester United secure a 2-0 victory and another three points.
Elsewhere, Brentford were unexpectedly held to a home draw by Swindon.
That result gave New Manchester United a two-point lead at the top of the table.
However, perhaps their mentality changed after moving into first place.
Or perhaps other teams had begun preparing specifically to stop them.
Whatever the reason, New Manchester United were held to a 0-0 draw by Stoke City at the City Ground on October 13.
The Red Rebels dominated the entire match and launched attack after attack, but Stoke defended with every player behind the ball.
As Mourinho put it afterward, "They brought every player back into their penalty area.
"To use a Portuguese expression, they took the bus that should have been parked outside the stadium and left it in front of their goal.
"It was terrible. Absolutely terrible."
Amused by the remark, one reporter jokingly asked, "Will you sack the people responsible for the City Ground's parking and stadium management?"
Mourinho's expression immediately brightened.
He laughed and nodded.
"You've reminded me.
"Yes, I'm going to report this to the club owner at once.
"The people responsible for managing our stadium are clearly terrible!"
The reporters assumed he was joking.
Two days later, however, they were invited back to the City Ground.
"Look, I wasn't lying," Mourinho said.
"We really have appointed a new head groundsman.
"He's excellent and highly professional.
"He came from Arsenal, where he wasn't given the recognition he deserved, so we brought him here."
Mourinho then introduced Paul Burgess to the same reporters who had doubted him.
Ethan had recruited Burgess from Arsenal with the offer of a higher salary and far greater responsibility.
He would oversee the operation and maintenance of the entire playing surface and all football-related areas of the stadium.
His authority was considerably greater than it had been at Arsenal.
Naturally, this did not include commercial operations such as club shops and hospitality.
Burgess was responsible solely for sporting matters, particularly the pitch.
The reporters were initially stunned by Mourinho's response.
Then they realised he had been playing with them.
That did not matter.
What mattered was that they had found another story.
Relations between New Manchester United's supporters and Arsenal's fans were already extremely poor.
The hostility had intensified after Steve Bruce's Red Rebels unexpectedly defeated Arsenal in the FA Cup two years earlier.
Arsenal supporters had grown to despise New Manchester United, and the feeling was mutual.
Now New Manchester United had poached a full-time groundsman from Arsenal.
The reporters immediately found countless sensational angles and described the appointment as revenge against the London club.
It was also widely known that Wenger had loaned Manninger to Fiorentina that season.
Arsenal were searching for a capable goalkeeper who could eventually succeed David Seaman.
At exactly that moment, Čech was producing exceptional performances for New Manchester United.
He was also still very young.
Naturally, the media began linking him with Arsenal.
New Manchester United wanted to poach Arsenal's staff?
Then the newspapers would help Arsenal poach one of theirs.
The London media were particularly enthusiastic.
They clearly wanted to see the northern club suffer a setback, so they repeatedly invented stories about Čech moving to Arsenal.
Some even claimed that Wenger had already submitted an offer worth as much as £5 million, which would break the transfer record for a goalkeeper of Čech's age.
At first, Ethan paid little attention to the rumours.
Believing everything printed in the newspapers would be like believing pigs could fly.
But just when he dismissed the story completely, Wenger actually made an offer.
(To be continued.)
◇◇◇
◇ One bonus chapter will be released for every 200 Power Stones.
◇ You can read the ahead chapter on Pat if you're interested: p-atreon.c-om/Blownleaves (Just remove the hyphen to access normally.)