Ruben Amorim apologised to fans after Manchester United’s stunning defeat on penalties to fourth-tier Grimsby in the Carabao Cup and was clear that a line needed to be drawn. “I think this is a little bit the limit,” he said. “Something has to change. In this moment, we need to focus on the weekend and then we have time to think.”
There are plenty of pointers.
Amorim’s stubbornness
Being cast-iron sure of your football vision is as vital for a head coach as being confident enough that the vision can be tweaked if results nosedive. Clearly Amorim has an undying faith in his 3-4-3 formation – but seemingly lacks the latter as he did lack the courage to watch the penalty shootout defeat at Grimsby, instead sitting hunched and feeble-looking in the dugout. Adjusting the stance regarding his football vision would be prudent. Wednesday’s Carabao Cup capitulation against Grimsby was the latest evidence of this.
It all casts the Portuguese as Manchester United’s Russell Martin: a hubristic number one who believes that having an unshakeable blueprint shows he is a man of principle. The logic is easy to follow – and misguided. While players need to be sure that their manager believes in the plan for them to buy into it wholesale. The caveat, though, is this: if they follow it 100% and it still blows up so badly that a paltry 27 points from 29 Premier League games are accrued on top of being bombed out of the League Cup by League Two opposition you have to change. So far the man from Lisbon is not for turning.
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Address the game model
United’s director of football, Jason Wilcox, is conscious that Amorim can be stubborn and while part of Wilcox’s role is to back the head coach, the time is ripe to discuss his manager’s beleaguered 3-4-3 and the chanceless play it produces. Erik ten Hag came under pressure from Dan Ashworth, Wilcox’s predecessor, to adjust his game model. When results did not turn around, the Dutchman was sacked.
Wilcox has the power to instruct Amorim to field a different shape so why might he not? Wilcox, plus Omar Berrada, the chief executive, and Jim Ratcliffe, the head of football, all hired the Portuguese on his 3-4-3 ticket, which makes it tricky for Amorim to be curtly informed there is a loss of faith in the system and the 40-year-old himself.
Make Mainoo a starter
In a terrible team performance at Blundell Park there were glimpses of what the 20-year-old Kobbie Mainoo offers, especially in the first half. Mainoo padded about midfield, laying off balls, moving to make himself available, and was able to escape incoming traffic by turning in tight areas: the kind of number 8 skillset Amorim’s United miss.
Yet the coach’s current assessment is that a player who scored the 2024 FA Cup final-winning goal over Manchester City and was England’s European Championship breakout star that summer – starting the final – is not good enough for the starting XI.
This has been Mainoo’s status since last Christmas, yet United’s results have not improved in his absence. While the head coach’s relations with Marcus Rashford and Alejandro Garnacho have broken down, he has no problem with Mainoo, so why not move Bruno Fernandes back to his regular number 10 slot and give Mainoo a chance as the fulcrum.
Goalkeeper farrago
Altay Bayindir’s error allowed Arsenal’s winner at Old Trafford in the 1-0 opening day loss and André Onana was culpable for both Grimsby goals. Clearly a new keeper is needed. Quick.
Amorim expects to sign Senne Lammens from Royal Antwerp imminently but at 23 and with no senior Belgium caps he surely cannot be an instant solution to United’s goalkeeping problems. Instead, Bayindir may depart should Lammens arrive. If that happens a head coach who does not fancy Onana at all – he was a substitute at Fulham despite being fully fit – will have to pick the error-prone Cameroonian.
MUTV grilling sums up United’s mess
All club TV channels are Pravda-like, acting as a PR for the head coach and players. But cut to the aftermath of United’s grim night at Blundell Park and MUTV tore up the policy as Diogo Dalot was given the fourth-estate treatment.
The in-house station pointedly asked Dalot whether United should have the talent to beat a fourth-tier side. Dalot’s answer: “Exactly. Not just the quality, but obviously the minimum standards that you ask in every game, the approach to the game.
“The best way for us to have respected Grimsby today was to come here and play 100%. I think that’s what we need to improve for the future. I don’t want to go through the same sentence time and again. We just have to show [that] and we just lost one opportunity today to show that we deserve to be here.”
