Rio Ferdinand
Rio Ferdinand blasted Manchester United after their defeat to Nottingham Forest
Rio Ferdinand branded Manchester United a 'shambles' following their dreadful defeat to Nottingham Forest.
Nikola Milenkovic opened the scoring for Forest in the first two minutes before Rasmus Hojlund got United back on level terms. Andre Onana then made a huge gaffe as he completely missed Morgan Gibbs-White's shot, which appeared to be straight at him.
Chris Wood quickly added a third for the visitors, who rode out a late assault following Bruno Fernandes ' strike. It was another dire defeat for United, who now find themselves 13th in the Premier League, eight points adrift of the top four.
Ruben Amorim has won just one top-flight match since he replaced Erik ten Hag as the Red Devils' manager. In a sign of how far Amorim has to go to turn things around, Ferdinand issued a brutal verdict of his side's performance against Forest.
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The United legend took to Twitter in the latter stages of Saturday's defeat, writing: "Shambles." Ferdinand's former team-mate Gary Neville also pulled no punches in his assessment of the defeat.
"When you keep changing players and you keep changing your back three and you take five players off, you're basically saying to all of them, because they've obviously been taken off at the start of the game, that you don't trust them," Neville told NBC Sports.
"It looked really scruffy. They looked a mess at the end United with no real shape. In the first half they weren't brilliant but at least they had a shape to them. Pick an XI that you think are the best. Almost give that XI the faith and trust."
Manchester United's Portuguese head coach Ruben Amorim reacts
Ruben Amorim has now won just one Premier League game since taking charge of United
"No good team is ever a good team without hard work. Manchester United are 13th in the league. Their running stats, their distance covered is 16th in the league. You don't deserve anything if you're being outrun every single week."
Amorim is well aware of the hard work he has ahead of him, having cut a dejected figure for much of Saturday's game. But he insisted he would not change his tactics as he looks to turn United around.
"We already knew it will be a long journey. But we want to win because this is a massive club and you feel it. When you lose one game, it is really hard for everybody and I can understand that. I can feel it in the stadium after the first goal," he said.
"We understand the context, but we have to keep in the same way, doing the same things. The same words that I had after Everton, I have today. Continue to focus on the performance.
"We need to improve a lot of aspects of the game and continue to do things in training. I had this and worse at Sporting in the beginning. We have to continue to do the same things and improve the team because this will turn around. We need time and to continue to work in the same way every day."
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