Ruben Amorim - Manchester United Head Coach | Thread locked during matches

stepic said:
In terms of the way we are playing. That first half against Lyon last week we played some lovely football. Anyone without their blinkers on should be able to see the progress we’ve made, even if it’s not always translating into points. It’s a team sport and a few key missing pieces will always impact the whole.
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Agreed. Plus the fact that we lost Martinez, Amad, Collyer, Mainoo, Mount during the space of a couple of weeks back in January, sent Rashford, Antony and malacia out on loan without replacing either attacking player with even one half decent forward. We've now lost De ligt, Heaven and even Zirkzee just as he started to look decent too.

Manager has hardly had much luck with player availability. Oh yeah he even lost both backup keepers and his only new first team signing got sent off and suspended for 3 games.
 
GaryLifo said:
A point lost on quite a few on here unfortunately. They want results and they want them NOW
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Impatience would be calling for his head if we were lingering around 8th again. We’ re not. We are averaging about a point a game and there is a real chance of us finishing 17th.

I’m all for giving managers time until we get towards the actual relegation spots. Then I’m more interested in why we should be giving them time. There is no tangible justification here.
 
JimiboyX said:
Impatience would be calling for his head if we were lingering around 8th again. We’ re not. We are averaging about a point a game and there is a real chance of us finishing 17th.

I’m all for giving managers time until we get towards the actual relegation spots. Then I’m more interested in why we should be giving them time. There is no tangible justification here.
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Well you're halfway to wrapping your head around the immense influence intangible factors can have on what we see on the pitch.
 
Regulus Arcturus Black said:
Typical bullshit from so many posters, quickly rewriting history that 14th & 1 point per game is fine because the squad is so shit despite claiming just months ago the squad would finish much higher.
So many debating in bad faith because they daren’t criticise a manager who has had a laughably bad start.
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I predicted 8th or more likely lower. No rewriting history there, the vote is locked for all to see.
 
JimiboyX said:
Impatience would be calling for his head if we were lingering around 8th again. We’ re not. We are averaging about a point a game and there is a real chance of us finishing 17th.

I’m all for giving managers time until we get towards the actual relegation spots. Then I’m more interested in why we should be giving them time. There is no tangible justification here.
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There is a justification. The people running the club are seeing things behind the scenes they like and are of the view that there are plenty of mitigating factors which mean they are not judging him on results this season. Go back and listen to Ratcliffe's interviews with Gary Neville and the BBC where he makes this very clear.

So they won't be using the league position this season as a metric for whether the manager keeps his job in the summer. Next season, I suspect they will be though.
 
Marwood said:
I don’t think there's much in it. I think we're worse this season because Hojlund hasn't had that six or seven game spell he had last year and the pressure of not scoring has ramped up and up on the team. That's basically the difference. Hojlund had that six game spell and we won 16 out of 18 points in that run.
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So manager gets less out of player… blame erm, player.

No wonder you won’t even criticise him the slightest, you’ve admitted we bought better defenders but yet we concede as many, and we replaced McTom’s goals with Amad and added Zirkzee but still can’t match last seasons 8th place, in fact, we’re much worse.

At what point do we suggest the manager isn’t getting enough out of his squad/players?

I mean even this season, pre Amorim Højlund had 7 games, 1 goal, 1 assist.
Post it’s 20 games, 2 goals, 0 assists.

So both Garna and Højlund got worse from November, but it’s all their fault right?
 
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Regulus Arcturus Black said:
Which you revised in September.

Regardless, absolutely no one was predicting Amorim come in and make us take 1 point per game and finish in 14-15th as the standard for this squad, and absolutely not you.
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No I didn't. I said we could maybe finish 5th at best if we sacked Ten Hag in September - we didn't and the season predictably unravelled.
 
Marwood said:
Can you name me 5 specialist wingbacks who are incapable of being a fullback or a winger?
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I can name one, Dorgu.

He doesn't look technical or dangerous enough to be a top drawer winger or disciplined enough to be a fullback. He's got an engine on him which is the tradeoff.
 
Even if he wins the Europa League, I'm not sure I'd keep him.

I wasn't expecting him to completely turn it around this season, but the results have been just that bad, I have a hard time seeing a manager turn it around after this kind of a bad start.

Not sure it's ever been done recently.
 
Leftback99 said:
Where have I said its the 15th best squad?
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Leftback99 said:
We might have a top half 'squad' by depth but it's the first 11-14 that really counts and that's where we really aren't far off the 15th best team in the league.

We don't have any goalscorers, we have one top 6 level player (Bruno) and a couple of decent CBs. Relegation/championship level forwards and a historically bad goalkeeper.
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Right here….

So either a new manager was capable of lifting us to 5th because that’s what a top manager can do, else you’ll quickly excuse that new manager for making us worse and finishing 15th because the team is actually that shit.

Feels a little like you’re shifting goalposts here ?

You obviously thought a new top manager could get much more out of this squad, yet now argue there’s nothing more he could’ve done?

In hindsight, simply improving our position to say 10th would’ve been shit but at least something. Right now we have absolutely nothing but a fools hope that a club who makes so many wrong decisions has in fact, got this one bang on despite all the evidence so far pointing in a different direction.
 
Regulus Arcturus Black said:
Right here….

So either a new manager was capable of lifting us to 5th because that’s what a top manager can do, else you’ll quickly excuse that new manager for making us worse and finishing 15th because the team is actually that shit.

Feels a little like you’re shifting goalposts here ?
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Erm..
That post literally says we have a top half squad.
:lol:

I thought we'd could do better in September but by the end of October I had no confidence that a new manager would do much with these players.

https://www.redcafe.net/threads/doe...-able-to-fix-this.485324/page-2#post-32570052
 
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For those saying a CF scoring wouldn't make much difference.

Last season Hojlund had that 6 game run of scoring. We picked up 16 out of 18 points in that six game spell.

The 6 games before that where he didn't score. 7 out of 18 points.

The 6 games he played after that run he he scored one goal. We got 7 out of 18 points. One win in those games. The only game he scored in.

Unless I've messed up my counting I think that says a lot.

That six game run of Hojlund scoring was pretty much what stopped last season being the disaster this season is.
 
Marwood said:
For those saying a CF scoring wouldn't make much difference.

Last season Hojlund had that 6 game run of scoring. We picked up 16 out of 18 points in that six game spell.

The 6 games before that where he didn't score. 7 out of 18 points.

The 6 games he played after that run he he scored one goal. We got 7 out of 18 points. One win in those games. The only game he scored in.

Unless I've messed up my counting I think that says a lot.

That six game run of Hojlund scoring was pretty much what stopped last season being the disaster this season is.
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Similar to 22/23 where Rashford's 10 in 10 papered over a lot of cracks but ultimately earnt us a 3rd place finish. I said pre season we were heavily reliant on similar happening again.
 
Leftback99 said:
Similar to 22/23 where Rashford's 10 in 10 papered over a lot of cracks but ultimately earnt us a 3rd place finish. I said pre season we were heavily reliant on similar happening again.
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Yep. Rashford's run just went on about 4 games longer. If Hojlund had carried it on for 10 games like Rashford 22/23 instead of 6 we'd have likely got 4th spot.

9 games Hojlund scored in last season. We won 8 of them.

That's the impact a striker scoring can have.

It could be argued how come Amorim hasn't got a run out of these players.

But those patches of form were so random. They came out of nowhere and then abruptly ended. It's not like we can put them down to anything. Was just one of those little stetches of games where stuff just happens for a player.
 
Raoul said:
The obvious difference being Tuchel had access to mostly the same players who finished top 4 just six months earlier. If you inherit a CL calibre team, that's much better than inheriting one who finished mid table.
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More like he's a vastly better manager than Amorim and why INEOS wanted him in the summer and barely even looked at Amorim.
 
Ronaldo's Love Child said:
So you were expecting us to get relegated?

I'm getting a bit fed up with listening to xP data for this and xP data for that. The points on the board and the performances on the pitch don't lie.
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Exactly. It’s like folk are shifting the goal posts to support Amorim when not one fan envisaged it would be this bad. I’m not sure how people can watch us get turned over in the vast majority of games and think he’s building up to anything beyond being sacked next season.
 
roseguy64 said:
More like he's a vastly better manager than Amorim and why INEOS wanted him in the summer and barely even looked at Amorim.
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They obviously didn’t “barely look at Amorim” given that they went out of their way to get him mid season.
 
Marwood said:
For those saying a CF scoring wouldn't make much difference.

Last season Hojlund had that 6 game run of scoring. We picked up 16 out of 18 points in that six game spell.

The 6 games before that where he didn't score. 7 out of 18 points.

The 6 games he played after that run he he scored one goal. We got 7 out of 18 points. One win in those games. The only game he scored in.

Unless I've messed up my counting I think that says a lot.

That six game run of Hojlund scoring was pretty much what stopped last season being the disaster this season is.
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Yep. There's a sitter missed and a 3 on 2 situation that Hojlund messed up against Wolves.

A decent striker takes advantage and bags those goals. We then have a vastly different game leading 1-0 or 2-0.
 
cpresc said:
I can name one, Dorgu.

He doesn't look technical or dangerous enough to be a top drawer winger or disciplined enough to be a fullback. He's got an engine on him which is the tradeoff.
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He's only just become a wingback since he joined us. Literally played about 6 games in the role. How can that be his only possible position when previously he was a fullback or winger. And he's only 20.

But if the worry is ending up with a team of 343 specialists it should be possible to list loads of them.

But we can't. Because there's no such thing as 343 specialist players. It's not something we have to worry about.
 
Marwood said:
For those saying a CF scoring wouldn't make much difference.

Last season Hojlund had that 6 game run of scoring. We picked up 16 out of 18 points in that six game spell.

The 6 games before that where he didn't score. 7 out of 18 points.

The 6 games he played after that run he he scored one goal. We got 7 out of 18 points. One win in those games. The only game he scored in.

Unless I've messed up my counting I think that says a lot.

That six game run of Hojlund scoring was pretty much what stopped last season being the disaster this season is.
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That's a pretty compelling argument to be fair, and gives me a bit of hope for next season if we did sign a competent striker.

However what I would say - let's say we had a striker that is worth an extra 10 points alone for us this season, that would still only put us 9th-11th in the league which is still dismal. Could a striker be worth 20 points alone? Hard to imagine.

Point being we need a lot more goals and assists from our two 10s and wing backs.

Might be unpopular but if it's at all possible I'd sell Zirkzee, loan Hojlund (since no one would be dumb enough to pay an acceptable fee) and bring in 2 strikers. Neither Zirkzee or Hojlund are good enough to be back up strikers.
 
Its been a very good read this thread. So informative, well thought off posts.

Now, or rather about 10 or so pages back, its become circular fecking arguing between two groups of posters barricaded in their trenches.

Dont have a stomach for it anymore to continue reading it, sorry. Especially when Amorims critics have some valid points while Rubens believers swiftly rejecting any kind of concerns.

From the outside looking in Ruben Amorim seems a top, possitive fella. Would like to give him a chance knocking out Bilbao in these difficult times instead of pile on. Just get United for a little while.
 
Deco10Legend said:
Different positions, hard to tell.
Neves is a cm, established player already. Mora is an Am, maybe even a second striker, the things he is doing at 17 are incredible.
No 17 old player has scored 8 goals in the Portuguese league in half a century or something. Not even CR7 was this lethal at this age. He has ballon dor potencial.

Obviously he is still green, needs to improve his decision making. He has improved a lot defensively but he is still a kid, improving day by day.

He has moments of absolute genius, his creativity and technique are amazing but he is not at Yamal’s level of consistency and maturity yet. Not even close.

The best for him would be to stay at Porto a couple of years as a first starter to improve even more.

I don’t think he is ready for the premier league, he is too small, needs to bulk up a bit, the intensity would be too much for him at this point, but I might be wrong, the way he is improving is astonishing.

Hopefully he will be smart enough to not follow Felix footsteps.
But I’m sure the the big sharks won’t wait long but I’m sure AVB will play hardball at least for him to stay another year.
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Wow that's high praise! Thanks for the summary. Very exciting prospect and I hope for his and your sake, you keep him for a good number of years. It's crazy how good your country is at producing talent.
 
acnumber9 said:
But we could buy those players with another manager too. Basically it would boil down to one game being the reason to keep a manager. We should probably learn from that mistake.
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The main reason to keep the manager would be the same one we appointed in the first place - just 6 months ago he was one of the most highly rated young managers in Europe, who had previously been involved in overhauling a squad and coming out the other side with a much better side.

If football fans had to vote who "the next big thing" would be in management in summer of 2024, Arne Slot or Amorim, Amorim would be winning a landslide vote. So either he was a shit manager all along and had the world fooled, or he's walked into some very bad circumstances at United with no pre-season, no transfers, and no players who can actually score a goal to win us a game.

Now I know we can say "ETH was highly rated before us" too - but the point is Ten Hag demonstrated over 2 years and hundreds of millions of pounds that he didn't understand the importance of physicality in the league, and what qualities the team needed to improve. In summer 2024 we knew we could discard what ETH had done at Ajax because he'd been given a fair crack to try improve United and failed.

Amorim has not had the chance that ETH did.
 
With the EL and the CL spot, his tenure becomes "interesting" again in that he has the chance to aim high as soon as next season.
 
It's increasingly hard to make a case in his defence. Sure he's been dealt a difficult hand with injuries, but he's played it poorly, 6 months in I can't point to a single player and say he's meaningfully improved under Amorim. Nice to see some of the youth get a chance, but I it was forced on him, he didn't drop underperforming first team players for them.

The only thing that will keep him in a job is the extreme reluctance to make another change.
 
I wonder how far the players aren't good enough is going to get him with INEOS. I mean next year if he's 15th place after 10 games do you think their going to take ownership and say they got the recruitment wrong in the summer?

Since the beginning of time football managers have been getting fired despite having shite players available to them and injuries. Why world Ruben be the exception? It almost sounds like a new paradigm is being argued in here.
 
Raoul said:
They obviously didn’t “barely look at Amorim” given that they went out of their way to get him mid season.
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Obviously not since he was chomping at the bit to join any relatively established club in England to run away from Sporting and had to apologise for being silly.
 
roseguy64 said:
https://www.skysports.com/football/...-to-clubs-fans-after-confirming-hammers-talks

https://www.espn.co.uk/football/story/_/id/40048711/why-ruben-amorim-lost-liverpool-job-arne-slot

Being eager to join West Ham and Liverpool and then apologising.
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Thanks. This is interesting. So West Ham, Liverpool, and later City (rumored) and finally United were in the mix for him. He was clearly doing something right down at Sporting to be contacted by multiple English clubs.
 
Martinez4midfield said:
Since the beginning of time football managers have been getting fired despite having shite players available to them and injuries. Why world Ruben be the exception? It almost sounds like a new paradigm is being argued in here.
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No one thinks he is the exception. No one is arguing he should never be fired. The main argument from his supporters is simply that he should be given a summer transfer window and a pre-season. If he gets that and we’re still struggling at the bottom of the table next season then he’ll be fired like any other manager would be, and rightly so.
 
Dominos said:
The main reason to keep the manager would be the same one we appointed in the first place - just 6 months ago he was one of the most highly rated young managers in Europe, who had previously been involved in overhauling a squad and coming out the other side with a much better side.

If football fans had to vote who "the next big thing" would be in management in summer of 2024, Arne Slot or Amorim, Amorim would be winning a landslide vote. So either he was a shit manager all along and had the world fooled, or he's walked into some very bad circumstances at United with no pre-season, no transfers, and no players who can actually score a goal to win us a game.

Now I know we can say "ETH was highly rated before us" too - but the point is Ten Hag demonstrated over 2 years and hundreds of millions of pounds that he didn't understand the importance of physicality in the league, and what qualities the team needed to improve. In summer 2024 we knew we could discard what ETH had done at Ajax because he'd been given a fair crack to try improve United and failed.

Amorim has not had the chance that ETH did.
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He may not have had the chance to overhaul the team but again, he needs to earn that chance. Plenty of highly rated coaches have turned out to not be good enough. David Moyes did a good job at Everton. It doesn’t mean he was good enough for United.

What Amorim has done is walk into the club and made us worse. He may turn it around but that doesn’t change what has happened to date. He has to improve. A lot.
 
Raoul said:
Thanks. This is interesting. So West Ham, Liverpool, and later City (rumored) and finally United were in the mix for him. He was clearly doing something right down at Sporting to be contacted by multiple English clubs.
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I’m not sure there’s a single poster who would argue he didn’t do a top job in Portugal. Much the same as everyone who was unanimous in praise of the job EtH did in Holland.
Not really sure of your point?
 
acnumber9 said:
He may not have had the chance to overhaul the team but again, he needs to earn that chance. Plenty of highly rated coaches have turned out to not be good enough. David Moyes did a good job at Everton. It doesn’t mean he was good enough for United.

What Amorim has done is walk into the club and made us worse. He may turn it around but that doesn’t change what has happened to date. He has to improve. A lot.
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For me I’d always run a football club as such that I’d buy players for the club (not the manager) and I’d expect to see improvement from the coaching and in results before giving more time.
My gut feeling on this is that we’re likely to end up looking dumber than we did last Summer if Amorim doesn’t win the EL and we keep him.

Either way, if he starts next season anything like this, I’d have him gone before October.
 
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