Wolves left with a third point of the campaign after Joshua Zirkzee’s deflected opener was cancelled out by Ladislav Krejci in the 1-1 draw.
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Manchester United manager Ruben Amorim is confident of a productive 2026 (Martin Rickett/PA)open image in gallery
Manchester United manager Ruben Amorim is confident of a productive 2026 (Martin Rickett/PA) (PA Wire)
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Ruben Amorim remains confident about Manchester United’s potential this season despite ending a turbulent 2025 with a disappointing home draw with historically poor Wolves.
Rob Edwards’ side arrived at Old Trafford on a run of 11 successive Premier League defeats, leaving them rooted to the bottom of the standings with a meagre two points from 18 matches.
But Wolves left with a third point of the campaign as Joshua Zirkzee’s deflected opener was cancelled out by Ladislav Krejci as the sides drew 1-1 just three weeks after United won 4-1 at Molineux.
Bruno Fernandes, Bryan Mbeumo and Mason Mount scored that night but were among eight absentees for the sixth-placed Red Devils, who are two points behind Liverpool – the Reds have a game in hand – in the final guaranteed Champions League spot.
“I’m really confident,” boss Amorim said at the midway point of the campaign. “We just need to recover all the players, and I’m really confident.
“I don’t know what is going to happen until the end of the season. Then we will make the resume of the season.
“But I’m really confident when we recover all the players that we are going to be a strong team. There is no doubts in my mind.”
United begin 2026 on Sunday at rivals Leeds, where Amorim says he is “not going to risk anyone” making existing issues worse.
But the Red Devils would love a spark that was lacking against Wolves, who made life difficult and led to the Portuguese taking off goalscorer Zirkzee – who came in for injured Mount – at half-time to bring on teenager Jack Fletcher.
Amorim confirmed the decision was “just tactical”, and added: “We need to do what the game was asking.
“We were struggling, they put a lot of men in the middle of the park, and with Jack we balanced that. I think we recover the ball faster in the in the second half.
“In the first half, we struggled a little bit to recover the ball, so I’m just looking not for their age and the experience. In this moment, I just look what I can do to win the game.”
United reverted to Amorim’s favoured three-man defence having won with a back four – a set-up switch Wolves boss Edwards had predicted and prepared for.
The 43-year-old was proud of his players’ effort as they secured a first point since he took charge last month, with attention now turning to Saturday’s match against fellow strugglers West Ham.
“It’s nice to take something from the game,” Edwards said. “I do feel it’s the least we deserve. I do. It’s progress. Overall, it was a really good performance.”
Asked if his players could sense unease from the United fans, Edwards said: “Yeah, we talked about that at half-time.
“We said to the lads, even when we were walking up the tunnel, ‘listen, listen’ because we know how difficult is to play in front of an unhappy crowd at the moment.
“And ours are rightly unhappy. I get it, so I’m not complaining about that.
“But, again, everyone tonight will be turning up expecting a win, maybe a comfortable one, and it wasn’t that.
“I think they saw we created a few chances, and we were good and good value for it, so they won’t be happy. We had to try and play on that. We talked about that at half-time.”