Souness slams two ‘so-called footballing people’ at Man Utd; claims INEOS ‘don’t really get football’

Liverpool legend Graeme Souness is starting to doubt that “so-called footballing people” Dan Ashworth and Jason Wilcox will lead Man Utd to success.

The Red Devils have made a terrible start to the new Premier League season after the board decided to stick with Erik ten Hag over the summer.

Ten Hag was eventually sacked on Monday after guiding Man Utd to just three wins from their opening nine matches of the Premier League campaign.

Sir Jim Ratcliffe and INEOS promised an overhaul of how the club had done business in the previous decade since Sir Alex Ferguson’s departure as manager.

But similar mistakes seemed evident over the summer with INEOS choosing to stick with Ten Hag – who will be replaced by Sporting Lisbon’s Ruben Amorim – and giving him around £200m to improve the squad.

And Souness doesn’t think much has changed since the new Man Utd co-owners took charge of football operations and the Liverpool legend has questioned the decisions of “so-called footballing people” Ashworth and Wilcox in particular.

Souness told the Up Front podcast: “I think the club are at their lowest point in the history of the Premier League, with the lowest quality group of players they’ve had in that time.

“I look at Manchester United since Ineos came in and it’s screaming out to me that they don’t really get football. They’ve now got their so-called footballing people in charge, in Dan Ashworth and Jason Wilcox, and I can’t believe for a minute that they didn’t have an input on the players they signed in the summer.

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“They brought in Manuel Ugarte, Matthijs de Ligt and Joshua Zirkzee. If they think those players are good enough for United, they’re wrong.

“They’ve still allowed £200m to be spent on players like that. They’ve had one summer at the club and look what they’ve done with it. That has to fall at Ashworth’s door.

“Ruben Amorim’s job now is to get the best out of this group of players, in whatever system that may be. He is walking into what is a very difficult job.”

Souness’ comments come after former Tottenham midfielder Jamie O’Hara insisted that Ratcliffe has been a “disgrace” and a “joke” since taking over.

O’Hara told talkSPORT: “He’s a disgrace, Ratcliffe. He came in, gave it the big spuds, he’s this billionaire and he’s gonna do this and do that… he’s been a joke!

“All he’s done is get rid of 200 people, they’ve got to bring their own food in now, now he’s trying to penny pinch on a jet for his Ballon d’Or nominees.

“Come on mate. Give us a rest, will you? Don’t tell me you’re a billionaire and you’re going to do this and that. It’s a massive loserville, that one.”