For Ruben Amorim, “Manchester United’s Biggest Issue” might as well be a full-length novel at this point but there’s one thing that is glaring because it’s not in his control.
Since taking over, Ruben Amorim has dealt with everything from player transgressions to criticism of his formation and the Man Utd squad’s mentality being questioned.
However, the common thread in all that is that those things can be rectified with time and more importantly, by Amorim himself.
What about something that he has no control over and just needs to deal with? One player of his finally had enough.
Manager Erik ten Hag of Manchester United gives a pre-match interview with TNT pundits and former Manchester United players, Rio Ferdinand and Paul...
Photo by Ash Donelon/Manchester United via Getty Images
Ruben Amorim facing a running Man Utd problem
“I don’t think he comments, I think he criticises, which is a different thing. Not every one of us has to be phenomenal like he was as a player. That does not mean that we all have to be phenomenal.”
“They would love to be at the club, and that’s a problem I cannot resolve.”
Those are the comments from 2018 by Jose Mourinho regarding Paul Scholes, who had criticised Paul Pogba, not an uncommon thing for Scholes.
He’s not alone in the army of ex-players of United who continue to contribute and add to the air of toxicity around the club instead of dousing the flames.
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Ruben Amorim is facing the same problem now, be it doubts over his tactics or his training, with Scholes recently saying Amorim’s “head is fried” because of a tactical decision.
It comes on the heels of Scholes criticising Amorim’s warm-up methods, this time saying his head would be fried under Amorim.
From Wayne Rooney publicly accepting he told Marcus Rashford to leave, to Rio Ferdinand calling out Manuel Ugarte’s “raw speed” just a few appearances into his tenure, the ex-players always deal in extremes when more judgment and calm-headedness are expected from professionals who have been successful at the highest level.
Lisandro Martinez has had enough, but it’s a slippery slope
Previous Man Utd managers have called out player-turned-pundits but very rarely players call them out, especially as brutally as Lisandro Martinez has Paul Scholes.
Martinez took offence to Scholes saying he wasn’t good enough to win the league and flat-out said Scholes “wouldn’t survive” in England.
While that might be a cathartic response by Martinez, and probably warranted too, it also opens a slippery slope that can quickly ramp up the toxicity already present.
Amorim will have to be dragged uselessly into another off-field situation he has nothing to do with while not many will bet on Scholes changing his ways after this response.
The circus is never-ending and the worst thing is that the person most prone to losing his job because of it, the manager, can’t do anything about it.