Browsing: Amorims

Had Amorim’s one-year anniversary been marked on 1 October, judgement would have been almost exclusively negative.

At that point, only Tottenham of the 17 teams who remained in the Premier League throughout his tenure had fewer points than United’s 34 from 33 games. After three successive victories, Wolves and West Ham are also behind them now.

On Thursday, for the first time, Amorim was shortlisted for manager of the month. In his news conference he was asked about the possibility of Champions League qualification.

If they win at the City Ground, United will go second.

Even if it is only for a matter of hours, it will be the first time they have been that high, mid-season, since a victory at West Ham in September 2021, immediately before Solskjaer’s world unravelled.

Amorim warned of reading too much into his side’s current form. But three successive wins coupled with Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s ‘three-year’ comments, means a chronical of his first year does not read like an epitaph.

A month ago, the private stinging rebuke of one critic close to the dressing room was that Amorim’s enthralling news conferences were all he was good at.

Yet, while box office in their delivery, it is the part of the job he likes the least. He is emotional, which shows itself after games. But apart from solemn moments, when he speaks on behalf of the club on matters of importance, his words are not rehearsed.

His jovial nature is at odds with his intense and serious persona on the training ground – and his rather detached presence at times.

Last season, when media were allowed to observe the first 15 minutes of training before European games, it was noticeable that Amorim watched the routine sprints and rondos on his own, from a different pitch, sometimes 50 yards away.

This, it is explained, is partly because he has no role to play but also because he is using the time to think about the messaging he will deliver in the main session.

Filmed footage of his first training session last November shows Amorim telling midfielder Kobbie Mainoo exactly how many strides he needed to move after laying a pass off, then where to open his body out to create maximum passing angles.

This summer, sources said there were points where he had two players taking up the same positions in training, before running through different scenarios to ensure they moved into the right area of the pitch.

While this may seem peculiar it does make sense given Amorim knows which players fit into which slots in his team.

That first recorded session also showed Amorim working on speed in transition, especially defensive turnovers.

Finally, with gaps between games allowing full preparation weeks, this reinforced messaging is paying off. Awful days at Grimsby and Brentford are outliers rather than the norm.

United officials say now, as they have done consistently throughout the past 12 months, there has never been an internal conversation about Amorim’s future. The club’s hierarchy, from Ratcliffe down, is supportive. The aim for the season remains European qualification.

But have there been times when Amorim himself wondered if he would get this far?

“It’s hard to say,” he said. “There were some moments that were tough to deal with, to lose so many games, was so hard for me because this is Manchester United.

“Putting all the attention on Europa League and not winning, was massive.

“So, I had some moments that I struggled a lot, and was thinking maybe it’s not meant to be. Today is the opposite. Today I feel – and know – it was the best decision in my life, and I want to be here.”

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Ruben Amorim has faced increasing scrutiny over his tactics during a difficult 11 months in charge of Manchester United.

The United boss has refused to deviate from his favoured 3-4-2-1 formation since arriving at Old Trafford, despite a string of calamitous results.

Red Devils stars have reportedly been left ‘confused’ and ‘frustrated’ by Amorim’s tactical inflexibility, but the Portuguese may have now found a way to make the formation better suit his players.

Amorim has won just 19 of his first 50 games in charge of Man United but he brought up his half century with a 2-0 victory over Sunderland at Old Trafford on Saturday, thanks to goals by Mason Mount and summer signing Benjamin Sesko.

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Day 1. Day 10. Day 50. Day 100. Day 365?!

The past year has been tough on all Manchester United fans, but for Frank Illet, it really shows. Illet set himself a quirky challenge last October: he wouldn’t cut his hair until his beloved Red Devils won five games in a row.

“I thought it would only go for a few months and be a bit of a laugh,” Illet told ESPN. “It was something to spread humor to Man United fans during a difficult period of time.

“It didn’t feel unrealistic then, because the season before, they had won five games in a row.”

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At the time, United were still managed by Erik Ten Hag and had ended the previous season by winning the FA Cup final against Manchester City. Illet thought that it would be the perfect time to try out the challenge, despite all of the false dawns and inconsistent form the club have managed in recent years.

The 29-year-old boyhood United fan from the U.K. now living in Spain, started the challenge after a 0-0 draw with Aston Villa. He expected a five-win streak to come quickly. Instead, 77 games across all competitions and a change of manager later, it still hasn’t happened. In fact, the most Illet has been able to see in the past year were three wins in a row when Man United beat Rangers, Fulham, and FCSB in late January under current boss Ruben Amorim.

For context, Liverpool — the defending Premier League champions and United’s bitter rivals — have already won five games in a row this season in just over a month (33 days to be exact).

What began with a clean-shaven Illet has turned into a viral spectacle: a bush of hair growing longer and higher with every passing day and every dropped point.

His daily social media updates to more than 700,000 followers across Instagram and TikTok — counting up the days since his last haircut, whether United played that day or not — have turned him into a cult figure and a living, growing monument embodiment of the club’s travails.

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“I’ve had a lot of ups and downs, and the thing is, the sheer amount of it takes so much out of my time,” he said. “The washing, the brushing, the drying, everything takes so much longer than I’m used to.”

Illet’s mood has mirrored United’s fortunes. He was in the stands at Old Trafford to watch his team beat Chelsea 2-1 earlier this season, only to then see them lose 3-1 at Brentford a week later.

Add in the humiliation of a shock Carabao Cup exit to League Two side Grimsby Town, and even his optimism has started to fray.

“I’ve tried to keep positive, I’ve tried to keep optimistic,” he said. “But that was the moment where I thought that I couldn’t find a positive and keep pretending that something would happen.”

Manchester United fan Frank Illet has not cut his hair for a year because the team has not won five games in a row. Instagram

The reaction has not been universally positive. Police are investigating an incident at the Chelsea game in which one fan grabbed Illet’s hair aggressively and appeared to hurl abuse at him. “It was all a bit weird to be honest,” Illet said at the time. “I will always try to focus on the positives and hope that this was just a one-off.”

Despite United’s continuing on-pitch woes, Illet isn’t calling for Amorim to go. While reports swirl about the Portuguese coach’s future, he believes performances haven’t been as dire as results suggest.

“I don’t think changing the manager is certainly the answer,” he said. “I understand completely that people are saying that they want him out because they’re saying the most important thing in football is results.

“I do think there are some positives. We’ve had the most expected goals and shots in the league. There are a few things like that where a few of those goals go in, and we have completely different conversations. I think in the short term, we need good results immediately.”

With more than 30 Premier League games left this season, plus the FA Cup still to come, Illet hasn’t given up hope for his hair.

“We’ll find out together how much longer it can go,” he said with a laugh.

For now, United don’t have a five-game winning streak, though they have just begun a new run following Saturday’s 2-0 win over Sunderland. But Illet’s hair? That’s just about the only thing that has been going strong all year for anyone associated with Manchester United.

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It will be little comfort for Ruben Amorim after taking 34 points from his first 33 Premier League games as Manchester United boss, but at least he can say he saw it coming.

The Portuguese coach has made it no secret that his preference was to take the United job in the summer after being identified as Erik ten Hag’s replacement. He didn’t want to be parachuted in mid-season, believing that his appointment in November would create more problems than it would solve. Yet co-owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe and the board had other ideas and told Amorim it was now or never.

It was a move badged as an attempt to get a head-start on United’s route back to the top. Nearly a year on, it’s beginning to look like cutting corners, and it will be the manager — as it always is in these situations — who will eventually pay the price.

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The pressure ahead of Sunderland’s visit to Old Trafford on Saturday — Amorim’s 50th game in all competitions — is now off the scale. Many United fans have already decided that even a positive result will only delay the inevitable and in many ways, it’s a lose-lose situation for Amorim.

Win, and he’s unlikely to get much credit because United should be winning at home to promoted teams like Sunderland — who are fifth on their return to the top flight, with three wins and two draws in their first six games. Lose or draw, and it will be more fuel for the supporters who have already decided he needs to go.

Ruben Amorim is rightly the focus of criticism given the way he’s managed this Man United side, but there is plenty of blame to go around. Vince Mignott/MB Media/Getty Images

Amorim was surprisingly calm and collected in his news conference after last weekend’s 3-1 defeat at Brentford, but he’s smart enough to understand that the opportunity to add context to what’s happening under his watch has been and gone.

He could have pointed out that three missed penalties — two from Bruno Fernandes against Fulham and Brentford respectively, and one from Bryan Mbeumo in the Carabao Cup shootout defeat at Grimsby Town — have put a different slant on the start to the season. Or that individual mistakes — whether Luke Shaw against Manchester City, or Harry Maguire against Brentford — are consistently pulling the rug from under his game plan.

Only Amorim didn’t, largely because he’s realised the only debate that matters now is the referendum on his future. Stay or Go? Amorim in, or Amorim out? Nothing else seems to matter. It was noteworthy that as he spoke in the media theatre at the Gtech Community Stadium, he suggested he was not in a position to “protect himself” in interviews.

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Jose Mourinho, one of Amorim’s mentors, had a habit of going down fighting in these situations, taking aim at anyone unlucky enough to drift through his crosshairs. Amorim has chosen a different approach. If anything, he’s dragged the focus back onto himself instead of pointing fingers, and that’s good news for Ratcliffe, who has been at Old Trafford longer and made far more mistakes than his manager.

Amorim would be well within his rights to highlight that last season, after being dropped into the job at an inopportune time, he was forced to throw away Premier League games in an attempt to win the Europa League and get back into the Champions League. Why else would he have started Tyler Fredricson, Harry Amass and Chido Obi in the 4-3 defeat at Brentford on May 4?

Amass made seven first-team appearances last season and is now on loan at Sheffield Wednesday. Chido Obi played eight times, but he’s now back with the academy rather than being part of Amorim’s squad. The game at Brentford in May came days before the 4-1 win over Athletic Club in the Europa League semifinal, second leg. At that point, the only thing worth chasing was the Europa League title.

It’s context that’s missing when Amorim’s league record of 17 Premier League defeats and a win rate of 27.3% is thrown back at him. It’s poor, no doubt, but there are reasons behind it.

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Amorim: Man United played like Brentford wanted us to

Ruben Amorim says Manchester United got sucked into Brentford’s game as they fell to a 3-1 defeat.

Privately, Amorim may well have other gripes. His squad is one that’s still under maintenance after mistakes made when Ten Hag was in charge. United have been clear that they cannot fix every position in one summer, but it’s left Amorim without the energetic midfielder he needs for his 3-4-3 system. Nor does he have a first-choice goalkeeper, with Altay Bayindir, Senne Lammens and Tom Heaton all understudies.

United should be doing better than they are — even Amorim would accept that — but there are limitations within this group of players whoever is in charge.

Not that it matters. Regardless of who the players are or who the manager is, United have to win every week, whoever they play. And there lies the biggest problem Amorim is having to deal with.

The disconnect between the history of the club, the expectation that comes with it and the reality of the situation they find themselves in is huge. United are driven by the idea of where they think they ought to be — not where they should be.

For more than a decade since Sir Alex Ferguson’s retirement, this disconnect has created additional pressure to be successful. The desperation to win, to catch Manchester City and Liverpool, has forced mistakes on and off the pitch, with bad decisions made and money spent poorly. There’s no time for projects and patience. Only chop, change, try again and hope for the best.

Front and centre for it all have been the managers. From David Moyes, to Louis van Gaal, to Mourinho, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and Ten Hag, Amorim is the latest to be chewed up in the race to get United back to the top. Don’t beat Sunderland on Saturday and he risks being spat out just like the others.

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With Chelsea visiting Old Trafford on Saturday, a trip to Brentford – where United have conceded four times on each of their last two visits – and encounters with Sunderland and then Liverpool at Anfield follow, making the chances of a significant upturn in fortunes in the short-term unlikely.

Scholes is not alone in believing United have no chance of reversing their fortunes unless Amorim changes his style, with all-time leading scorer Wayne Rooney believing his old side have “got worse” under the Portuguese, who replaced the sacked Erik ten Hag last November.

“He cannot carry on playing this way, he just can’t,” said Scholes, who won 11 Premier League titles and the Champions League twice in a 20-year career with the club.

“At some point there has to be a moment where he thinks, ‘I have to change something because what I am doing now is not working and I am not getting results’. The proof is there.

“I like Amorim, with everything he says, he seems to be a likeable man. But unfortunately results paint a picture.

“At this moment in time it isn’t good enough. At this moment in time if results don’t improve, performances don’t really matter that much. He has to win some games or the pressure is going to come on him massively.”

Following last season’s struggles, where United finished 15th in the league and lost the Europa League final to Tottenham, Amorim worked hard in the summer trying to create a harmonious dressing room culture.

While there are some within the United dressing room who are thought to be uneasy about the 40-year-old’s refusal to change his tactics, there is no sign of widespread discontent as yet.

The optimism around Amorim is not confined to the Old Trafford boardroom.

João Noronha Lopes, favourite to win the Benfica presidential election on 25 October, is thought to be keen on bringing him back to the club where he made his name as a player, making 154 appearances across six seasons.

Lopes was at Etihad Stadium for Sunday’s derby, where he was accompanied by Pedro Ferreira and Nuno Gomes, the former Portugal and Benfica forward, who is one of Amorim’s closest friends.

Speaking to Portuguese media before the group left for Manchester, Gomes spoke about the prospect of hiring him.

“I can’t answer that question,” he said. “Ruben Amorim is the coach of Manchester United.

“But one thing I do know, Ruben Amorim will be the coach of Benfica one day.”

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Match Of The Day pundit Danny Murphy believes Manchester United do not have the personnel needed to play Ruben Amorim’s…

What we have established is Amorim plays a positional style of football that looks to better opponents through overloads rather…