Manchester United are about to learn something about Jose Mourinho

For regular chroniclers of Jose Mourinho's managerial methods his process at Tottenham seemed to be accelerated since taking charge in November.

While the third season is usually when Mourinho and the club he's in charge of begin to grate under the tension he's created, that was already happening at Spurs inside the first few months of what has so far been a lacklustre tenure.

The three-month hiatus to the 2019/20 season might have given Tottenham and Mourinho some valuable breathing space. His win percentage of 42.3% is currently the worst in his managerial career and he'd already gone public in his disappointment with some players, notably Tanguy Ndombele.

A brief uplift when he arrived has been shattered by a tame Champions League exit to RB Leipzig and a six-game run without a win that was yet to be ended when the season was suspended.

Given the way Mourinho's reign at Manchester United unravelled there have been plenty of pundits putting the Portuguese's best days behind him. We're about to start finding out if that is the case.

If Mourinho returned to Old Trafford in December ready to prove a point then he and his Tottenham side failed miserably, with Ole Gunnar Solskjaer earning bragging rights and United good value for their 2-1 victory.

Now the Premier League season resumes for both clubs with a meeting at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on June 19. Another win for United will almost certainly end Tottenham's slim hopes of Champions League qualification next season and pile further pressure on Mourinho.

The narrative for the former United manager should certainly have changed. He was complaining bitterly about injuries back in March but should now welcome back Harry Kane, Heung-min Son, Steven Bergwijn and Moussa Sissoko.

Mourinho has also had time to rethink his Tottenham plans and spend valuable time planning strategy with his players, firstly via regular virtual fitness sessions and now back on the training pitches of Spurs Lodge. It might be stretching reality to call this a mini pre-season, but it's a longer uninterrupted spell on the training ground than Mourinho will have had with his side so far.

The first sights of whether he's managed to find any improvement will come against United. In theory, it's Solskjaer's side who enter the contest in good form, unbeaten in 11 games, with Spurs struggling. While that momentum may well have had the edge taken off, we've seen in the Bundesliga that teams such as Bayer Leverkusen have been able to maintain their form, while Schalke have continued to struggle.

The tantalising Friday night fixture will give us a clue as to whether Mourinho has worked some of the old magic on his Spurs side, or if the same old problems exist.

He's unlikely to be able to strengthen this squad much in the summer, given Tottenham's financial difficulties during the coronavirus pandemic and the £175million Bank of England loan they've taken out under the Covid Corporate Financing Facility. Splashing the cash in the transfer window two months later will not be a good look.

So if Mourinho is to transform Tottenham's fortunes it will have to come on the training ground. In less than two weeks United will get a glimpse of whether he still to be feared, or if his early struggles at Spurs might be about to continue.