Ruben Amorim | 2025-26

He's bought himself a lifeline. If he can somehow get a win against Liverpool then despite all the stick he's been getting, it will have actually been a decent start to the season.

Based on everhthing I've seen in the last 12 months it's more likely that Liverpool batter us and this is yet another false dawn but hey, it's nice to have a small amount of hope. Maybe Lammens was the missing piece of the puzzle all along.
 
iHicksy said:
Do you think? To me, it looked very similar to how we usually play, which is actually fairly direct. Amorin's game plan since he arrived is to essentially bypass the midfield with direct balls into the wingbacks/fowards. I hope you're right as it would mean he's at least slightly adaptable, but to my eye it looked exactly how we usually play, complete with the same flaws that will get exposed vs liverpool and which fulham, brentford etc exposed so easily.

I'd love to be wrong, because on paper he's everything you'd want in a united manager. Unfortunately the game is played on grass and not paper.
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It looked the same to me too, just Šeško was having a bit more luck.
 
always_hoping said:
If he gets his first back to back Premier league wins by beating Liverpool in Anfield some on here might suddenly start warming to Ruben Amorim again?
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Needs more than that for me. Just managed to watch the game. We were overall decent and Sunderland were poor. Deserved win.

He clearly won't be sacked over this break so he needs to prove himself between now and the November break. 4 matches.

Liverpool, Brighton, Forest and Spurs.
 
always_hoping said:
7 games played and Man United are only two points off 5th place and 4 points from 3rd,4th proving it's another less than vintage Premier League but under this manager you still can't help checking how many points the 18th placed team has..
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I'm not using the table this early to judge him. We'd need around at least 10 games into the season to make a decent assessment on that.
 
Big Ben Foster said:
The whole "we're only x points off 5th place" thing doesn't really mean anything when we're only a few games into the season. Unless we're literally losing every single game, there's never going to be that much distance between places at this point.
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Right. That's why when Amorim started we could have jumped up the table because there was still enough of the season to be played to make Europe despite our position.
 
Big Ben Foster said:
The whole "we're only x points off 5th place" thing doesn't really mean anything when we're only a few games into the season. Unless we're literally losing every single game, there's never going to be that much distance between places at this point.
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That's correct. It also squashes the logic that he should be sacked only 7 games into a new league season. There's plenty of football ahead where the new attack and keeper, plus Mount will all weigh in on how good the 2025/26 version of United truly are, which will eventually inform Amorim's future.
 
Raoul said:
That's correct. It also squashes the logic that he should be sacked only 7 games into a new league season. There's plenty of football ahead where the new attack and keeper, plus Mount will all weigh in on how good the 2025/26 version of United truly are, which will inform Amorim's future.
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Don't forget about Grimsby.
 
Irwin99 said:
I wonder if he makes it to January, does he get any signings like last year? A midfielder that can cover a lot of ground AND be technically excellent would help his system a lot.
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If he's managing us in Jan it will likely mean we are playing relatively well and are positioned to potentially qualify for Europe. So if the club see a chance to make a buy to enhance our chances of EL or CL qualification, I think they will do so. Ruben Neves would seem the most logical choice for the obvious reasons - midfield depth, Portuguese, and would be available.
 
He hasn't won a league game against a non-promoted team or against 11 men since 25 January (away to Fulham).

Needs to show he can regularly win Premier League games against seasoned and full strength opposition, which he has abjectly failed to do in his tenure.

He got schooled barely a week ago by Keith fking Andrews, so while Saturday's win against Sunderland is welcome, we've seen it before from him and the team and it hasn't led to any longer term improvement.

Next 4 games will be the perfect barometer of where the team is at under Amorim.
 
Raoul said:
That's correct. It also squashes the logic that he should be sacked only 6 games into a new league season. There's plenty of football ahead where the new attack and keeper, plus Mount will all weigh in on how good the 2025/26 version of United truly are, which will inform Amorim's future.
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Raoul said:
I've seen enough. Hopefully Ratcliffe and Berrada have as well.
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This was your own post after 6 games. I don’t follow why a home win against Sunderland (a match we should be winning 100 times out of 100) changes the position.

The true position is that, in line with your own posts which change week on week, Amorim’s future no doubt remains (rightly) on a knife edge. Had our fixtures been the other way around, and we’d had the comfortable home win followed by the thrashing by Brentford, then he’d be under massive pressure now. If he loses to Liverpool and then we don’t do well against Brighton and Forest, he will be back under huge scrutiny again.

The only way the pressure will relax is consistent performances - both home and away - and establishing ourselves in and around the Champions League places. In what looks a fairly weak premier league season, that shouldn’t be too tough a target.
 
Doracle said:
This was your own post after 6 games. I don’t follow why a home win against Sunderland (a match we should be winning 100 times out of 100) changes the position.

The true position is that, in line with your own posts which change week on week, Amorim’s future no doubt remains (rightly) on a knife edge. Had our fixtures been the other way around, and we’d had the comfortable home win followed by the thrashing by Brentford, then he’d be under massive pressure now. If he loses to Liverpool and then we don’t do well against Brighton and Forest, he will be back under huge scrutiny again.

The only way the pressure will relax is consistent performances - both home and away - and establishing ourselves in and around the Champions League places. In what looks a fairly weak premier league season, that shouldn’t be too tough a target.
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The sentiment to sack after a terrible performance is always there. But it does wear off for most after one comes to their senses.
 
Irwin99 said:
I wonder if he makes it to January, does he get any signings like last year? A midfielder that can cover a lot of ground AND be technically excellent would help his system a lot.
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It's his own fault. He persuaded Bruno to stay when we could have got 100 mill for him to help rebuild the midfield, and to compound the error he then plays him in midfield for practically every minute of every game, a position he's totally unsuited to!
 
Next 4 fixtures before the November international break: Liverpool (a), Brighton (h), Forest (a), Spurs (a).

3 away games, but 6-points has to be the minimum target here.

A home game which we should always be looking to win at Old Trafford, a Liverpool team who have lost three in a row, Forest who could very realistically have sacked Ange by the fixture and Spurs, who Amorim is well overdue getting a result against.
 
Seems like he'll surely be at the club now for the next 4 games until the November international break, at which point it'd be cheaper to sack him and there should be more sense as to whether a corner really has been turned or not.
 
Oscar Bonavena said:
It's his own fault. He persuaded Bruno to stay when we could have got 100 mill for him to help rebuild the midfield, and to compound the error he then plays him in midfield for practically every minute of every game, a position he's totally unsuited to!
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That's definitely the cynical way of looking at it. Another is that Bruno is a world class player and club captain, and he wanted him here because he believed he would be influential in to improving us this year - not just because of his goals, but also because of his overall influence in the dressing room and with the other players. And its not as if chucking £130m at Baleba would've fixed anything for us given how poorly he's playing so far this year. Some are blaming it on not getting a transfer to United, but it could also be that he's not quite as good as his YouTube comps would suggest.
 
Raoul said:
That's definitely the cynical way of looking at it. Another is that Bruno is a world class player and club captain, and he wanted him here because he believed he would be influential in to improving us this year - not just because of his goals, but also because of his overall influence in the dressing room and with the other players. And its not as if chucking £130m at Baleba would've fixed anything for us given how poorly he's playing so far this year. Some are blaming it on not getting a transfer to United, but it could also be that he's not quite as good as his YouTube comps would suggest.
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If Ruben thought playing Bruno in a midfield 2 alongside an aging Casemiro would be influential to us improving this year, then that's a damning indictment of his understanding of what it takes to win regularly the Premier league.

And probably explains why his win % has been so low.
 
Oscar Bonavena said:
If Ruben thought playing Bruno in a midfield 2 alongside an aging Casemiro would be influential to us improving this year, then that's a damning indictment of his understanding of what it takes to win regularly the Premier league.

And probably explains why his win % has been so low.
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Obviously that's what he did since that's what has happened. If he was as concerned about midfield as some in the pundit class are suggesting, he would've forgone buying one of Cunha or Mbeumo to instead invest in a CM. I'll not count Sesko into that since its widely believed he was a Vivell buy. Amorim wanted rid of Rashford, Garnacho, and Antony; requiring he buy their obvious replacements, more than he did buying a new midfielder.
 
van Nistelrooy said:
Next 4 fixtures before the November international break: Liverpool (a), Brighton (h), Forest (a), Spurs (a).

3 away games, but 6-points has to be the minimum target here.

A home game which we should always be looking to win at Old Trafford, a Liverpool team who have lost three in a row, Forest who could very realistically have sacked Ange by the fixture and Spurs, who Amorim is well overdue getting a result against.
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I think 6 seems a fair ask from that. 7 would be good going and anything above that would be great.
 
DOTA said:
I think 6 seems a fair ask from that. 7 would be good going and anything above that would be great.
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Would leave us on 16 points from 11 games, so 1 point better off than the same point last season (which happened to be when Amorim was appointed).

If that is how we go, we will probably be 9th or 10th, and on target for 55 points. Probably just about passable but needing quite a big improvement for the rest of the season to be in touch with the UCL places.
 
Doracle said:
Would leave us on 16 points from 11 games, so 1 point better off than the same point last season (which happened to be when Amorim was appointed).

If that is how we go, we will probably be 9th or 10th, and on target for 55 points. Probably just about passable but needing quite a big improvement for the rest of the season to be in touch with the UCL places.
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Its really the next 14 fixtures that will define the season since most of them are against non big 4 clubs and there should be plenty of points on offer if we are playing well. 4 of the games alone are against the current relegation sides and another is against Forest, who are objectively terrible at the moment - so plenty of opportunities to pick up points before a new round of top 4 fixtures begin in mid Jan.
 
Doracle said:
Would leave us on 16 points from 11 games, so 1 point better off than the same point last season (which happened to be when Amorim was appointed).

If that is how we go, we will probably be 9th or 10th, and on target for 55 points. Probably just about passable but needing quite a big improvement for the rest of the season to be in touch with the UCL places.
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I'd say we need to beat the 58 points that miserable Ole and Rangnick campaign ended on for it not to feel like another year of relentless suffering. So I'll go 60 points as the minimum and we've definitely got some work to do from here for that.
 
Damn I didn't realise how hard of a run we have coming up.

December onwards definitely eases up, but we'll have to have a big 6 weeks to still be in striking distance of Top 5.
 
Martial'sEmergingSmile said:
Damn I didn't realise how hard of a run we have coming up.

December onwards definitely eases up, but we'll have to have a big 6 weeks to still be in striking distance of Top 5.
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Our hard run (Arsenal/City/Chelsea/Pool) is more or less over on Oct 19th. We do have Spurs and Palace in Nov, but also have Brighton, Forest, Everton, and West Ham during that period. I would expect us to get up to 12 points out of those alone.
 
van Nistelrooy said:
Next 4 fixtures before the November international break: Liverpool (a), Brighton (h), Forest (a), Spurs (a).

3 away games, but 6-points has to be the minimum target here.

A home game which we should always be looking to win at Old Trafford, a Liverpool team who have lost three in a row, Forest who could very realistically have sacked Ange by the fixture and Spurs, who Amorim is well overdue getting a result against.
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I like the positive spin you put on our prospects. An alternative way of looking at it is we played 10 games against those teams last season. Drew 1 and lost the other 9.

So 2 wins from that run of games would probably give him until Christmas.
 
Oscar Bonavena said:
I like the positive spin you put on our prospects. An alternative way of looking at it is we played 10 games against those teams last season. Drew 1 and lost the other 9.

So 2 wins from that run of games would probably give him until Christmas.
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But then someone will tell you last season doesn’t count
 
Yakuza_devils said:
It starting to show that we have made significant upgrade from last season. The obvious ones:

1) Onana/Bayindir to Lemmens - day and night different

2) Hojlund to Sesko - beginning to see the difference and improvement from Sesko

3) Rashford/Garnacho (left 10) to Mount/Cunha - no need to elobrate here

4) Amad to Mbeumo (right10) - Mbeumo make the right 10 his own and allow Amad to play RWB. Both of them work well together.

Next season rebuild we need to:

1) Casemeiro to Anderson/Baleba
2) Bruno to Wharton
3) Dorgu to ???
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Are you watching Baleba this season?
 
Yakuza_devils said:
He is affected by the failed transfer to Man Utd in the summer? Similar thing happened to Caiceido before his move to Chelsea.

Anyway, Anderson could be a great option too.
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There was no bid for him there was exploratory talks with his people about a possible move and he was open to the idea but that was as far as it went.
Do you think he is playing bad intentionally to force a move to Utd in the coming windows?
 
Raoul said:
Obviously that's what he did since that's what has happened. If he was as concerned about midfield as some in the pundit class are suggesting, he would've forgone buying one of Cunha or Mbeumo to instead invest in a CM. I'll not count Sesko into that since its widely believed he was a Vivell buy. Amorim wanted rid of Rashford, Garnacho, and Antony; requiring he buy their obvious replacements, more than he did buying a new midfielder.
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Which is weird because why would you need to replace players who never play anyway?
 
Adz_99 said:
He's bought himself a lifeline. If he can somehow get a win against Liverpool then despite all the stick he's been getting, it will have actually been a decent start to the season.

Based on everhthing I've seen in the last 12 months it's more likely that Liverpool batter us and this is yet another false dawn but hey, it's nice to have a small amount of hope. Maybe Lammens was the missing piece of the puzzle all along.
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I think Lammens was a missing piece of the puzzle but I also think Mount made a massive difference. The attack looked a lot more balanced with him, Šeško and Mbuemo.
 
Bondi77 said:
There was no bid for him there was exploratory talks with his people about a possible move and he was open to the idea but that was as far as it went.
Do you think he is playing bad intentionally to force a move to Utd in the coming windows?
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Nope. It could affects his focus as it's a very big move that any young players would dream of. Hope he gets back to his form soon.
 
Reassessing the manager's performance game by game has it's limits. Rather, what would be an acceptable minimum result by the end of the year? What other signs off progress need to be demonstrated? (preferably measurable)
 
roseguy64 said:
Needs more than that for me. Just managed to watch the game. We were overall decent and Sunderland were poor. Deserved win.

He clearly won't be sacked over this break so he needs to prove himself between now and the November break. 4 matches.

Liverpool, Brighton, Forest and Spurs.
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I don’t think he can get fired after those 4 games though, nobody will be expecting much from them anyway. We have been horrendous away from him for virtually all his time here, and 3 of those games are away. We also haven’t beaten Brighton in a long while at OT, so we have to manage expectations in regards to that game as well. I think anyone would be happy with 4-5 points here, maybe fewer.

We are playing Everton, Bournemouth and West Ham at home, Wolves and Palace away after next international break, anything less than 7-8 points from these 5 could get him fired.
 
Raoul said:
That's correct. It also squashes the logic that he should be sacked only 7 games into a new league season. There's plenty of football ahead where the new attack and keeper, plus Mount will all weigh in on how good the 2025/26 version of United truly are, which will eventually inform Amorim's future.
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Ten Hag was sacked 9 games into last season. Do you think that was a mistake?
 
Bondi77 said:
There was no bid for him there was exploratory talks with his people about a possible move and he was open to the idea but that was as far as it went.
Do you think he is playing bad intentionally to force a move to Utd in the coming windows?
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Doubtful, but he's probably just been unsettled. We've seen it hundreds of times in football with young players.
 
AdNani said:
Funny how when we lose its the system but when we win it's thanks to the players.
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well, it was against a newly promoted side, not any one in top 6. Couple of nice goals and a keeper who actually remembered how to save doesn’t suddenly fix the shambles in midfield. i would have loved to agree with you that formation is not the problem and that we are building something! unfortunately the performances over the last year have made it crystal clear that this isn't the way to go forward.
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Sarni said:
I don’t think he can get fired after those 4 games though, nobody will be expecting much from them anyway. We have been horrendous away from him for virtually all his time here, and 3 of those games are away. We also haven’t beaten Brighton in a long while at OT, so we have to manage expectations in regards to that game as well. I think anyone would be happy with 4-5 points here, maybe fewer.

We are playing Everton, Bournemouth and West Ham at home, Wolves and Palace away after next international break, anything less than 7-8 points from these 5 could get him fired.
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We are Manchester United. We spent another £200m over the summer including 2 of the leagues biggest attacking talents. We have a good squad. Yet someone says 'nobody will be expected for them anyway'. I simply cannot believe how far standards and expectations have fallen at this club. We excuse the inexcusable all the time
 
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