Amorim and Man Utd reach sack-worthy new nadir as Sesko shrinks in shocking Grimsby defeat
As Ruben Amorim rocked from side to side on the bench during a penalty shootout at Blundell Park he must have been wondering whether this was his rock bottom. But there’s always a Manchester United nadir that’s yet to come under his cursed leadership, and it duly arrived in defeat to League Two Grimsby Town after a full 18 minutes of cowering introspection from a manager who should now realise that he’s the problem.
The general consensus at F365 over the summer was that we actually quite wanted Manchester United to do well this season. Mainly because of the thankless task of writing about game after game in which players unsuited to Ruben Amorim’s system failed to make the necessary adaptations. The strikers didn’t score goals, they didn’t create enough chances, the midfield left them horribly exposed, etc. etc.
And it got to a point where it was pretty clear that no matter the depths plumbed by the worst Manchester United team in living memory, Amorim would not be sacked, particularly with the potential for the Europa League trophy and ensuing Champions League football offering end-of-term sprinkles to decorate the turd that was the Portuguese manager’s debut season.
We weren’t allowed to forget that Amorim didn’t want to arrive mid-season and was pushed to make the move in a ‘now or never’ ultimatum from CEO Omar Berrada. He wanted a pre-season to embed his ideas, get some of ‘his players’ through the door and start afresh. We wonder what his excuse is now after a game which has comprehensively revived our belief in Manchester United finding new ways for us to enjoy them.
MAILBOX: Ruben Amorim ‘waiting to be sacked’ as Man Utd ‘more Spursy than Spurs’
We thoroughly look forward to remaining Amorim advocates laying the blame solely at Andre Onana’s door. At fault for both goals – allowing the first to squeeze under his body and coming to flap at a cross for the second – it was a performance to leave absolutely no doubt over the requirement for a new goalkeeper this summer even before his breadstick wrists cost United in the shootout.
But previous reports have suggested that doubts over that need have come from Amorim, whose off-season declaration of ‘trust’ in Onana was evidently misplaced on the basis of last season, while his claim only last week that he’s “happy with the three goalkeepers” points to either a hugely worrying lack of knowledge as to what it takes to be a Manchester United No.1 or direction from the hierarchy to temper expectations over the club’s wherewithal to sign a replacement.
And in any case, unless either Senne Lammens or Gianluigi Donnarumma can provide midfield stability while simultaneously holding the ball up and creating chances, United’s problems will not be solved by a new goalkeeper.
We all got a bit carried away after United impressed against Arsenal and none more so than Amorim, who claimed – after losing, lest we forget – that “we proved that we can beat every team in the Premier League.”
Not Fulham though, nor League Two Grimsby Town, who are three divisions and 56 places below Manchester United in the football pyramid and have a squad market value which is approximately four per cent of what their visitors paid for their new striker Benjamin Sesko.
His first start for the club won’t have convinced anyone that he’s any sort of upgrade on Rasmus Hojlund, who might just have scored had he had Sesko’s chance to score in stoppage time from four yards out and probably wouldn’t have been the last outfield player to take a penalty in the shootout. What was all that about? Not very Manchester United, is it now.
And after Bryan Mbeumo came off the bench at half-time to join him and Matheus Cunha to complete the summer signing forward triumvirate, what was a burgeoning hope that Amorim may just have cobbled together a means to create and score enough goals for United is fading fast.
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Mbeumo opened his account with a fine probing dribble and clever finish into the far corner but Cunha missed his penalty to ensure United’s £74m shrinking violet of a No.9 had to take his before Mbeumo missed the crucial one. You really can write it.
The problem in the minds of many is in midfield. Manuel Ugarte again staked his claim in a keenly contested battle to be the worst of all midfield signings made in the post-Sir Alex Ferguson era before being hooked at half-time for Bruno Fernandes, which granted us all an ill-fated look at the captain and wantaway Kobbie Mainoo together in the double pivot.
United did improve, but that felt as much to do with an inevitable increase in pressure from a Premier League side over a tiring League Two minnow as evidence of Mainoo-Fernandes being a viable future partnership. Amorim won’t have been convinced the uptick in creativity that did come was significant enough for him to make peace with the soft centre he’s worried about in Premier League games to come.
But maybe it won’t matter for much longer what Amorim thinks. Maybe Mainoo just needs to wait out Amorim, because the image of him with head bowed on the bench as his ragtag bunch of expensively signed footballers got dumped out of a cup competition they’re only playing in at this point because he did such a terrible job last season will be a hard one to shake for the players, the fans and the owners, who may as well pull the trigger now, because if there’s one thing we’ve learned about Amorim’s Manchester United, there’s always a new nadir.
MAILBOX: Ruben Amorim ‘waiting to be sacked’ as Man Utd ‘more Spursy than Spurs’
