Manchester United are staring into the abyss again after losing into Grimsby Town - and Ruben Amorim needs to change his attitude to start winning.
Ten days ago, Ruben Amorim told the media that his Manchester United side had “proved that we can beat every team in the Premier League” despite a 1-0 opening day defeat to Arsenal. He never said anything about beating League Two teams, mind you.
Wednesday’s galling EFL Cup loss to Grimsby Town represents a new nadir for a team that seem to find new depths to plumb on a weekly basis, but what made the penalty shootout defeat especially notable was Amorim’s utterly defeated air not only after the match, but during it.
Why Alexander the Great and Grimsby Town were equally unafraid of Manchester United
Alexander the Great supposedly said that he was “not afraid of an army of lions led by a sheep - I am afraid of an army of sheep led by a lion.” Judging by the body language of United’s coach and players, they now have sheep in both roles. Amorim’s post-match media interview has drawn plenty of negative attention already, and it betrayed a coach whose bullishness after the Arsenal game had gone up in smoke amid a sea of inflatable fish.
“We started the game without any intensity”, he said in thoroughly crestfallen fashion. “We were completely lost. It's hard to explain. When you see something different like today, it's hard to talk about that. I just want to say I'm really sorry to the fans… With all the defeats, with the team, today I have nothing to say apart from sorry.”
It’s fair to assume that Alexander the Great wouldn’t have been left quaking in his boots had he faced Amorim on the field of battle any more than Grimsby Town appeared to be overawed by their Premier League opposition at Blundell Park. Amorim has, no doubt, many qualities as a coach – his success at Sporting is proof of that – but his leadership seems to leave so much room for the doubt that has been gnawing at United for years to flourish.
Even before a microphone was shoved in his face after the game, the body language of both Amorim and his team was abysmal. As the teams prepared for the penalty shootout, Grimsby – despite the brutality of Harry Maguire’s late equaliser – were revving each other up, shouting exhortations in each other’s faces, lifting themselves . United stood around with hands on hips.
If any of United’s coaching staff or dressing-room leaders (should they happen to have any) offered any words of encouragement, it wasn’t caught on camera. Instead, they looked fretful and fussy, with nobody talking to each other at a moment when calm and concentration were required.
Amorim, for his part, then spent the penalty shootout hunched in a corner of the dugout, refusing to watch. It may be a tradition of his, but the optics were appalling. United are a side in need of focus and grit. They are getting none from their manager.
There are many reasons that Amorim’s tenure to date has been a failure, from his stubborn refusal to adapt his tactics to the players at his disposal to the numerous mistakes made by United’s recruitment team, but it’s hard to escape the feeling that perhaps the biggest single issue is the palpable lack of self-belief that seems to have seeped into every pore on every player. This is a team that heads into matches expecting the worst. If Amorim doesn’t fix that quickly, then another lost season is the likely consequence.
What Ruben Amorim needs to learn from Sir Alex Ferguson
Amorim, like Erik Ten Hag before him, inherited a dressing room atmosphere that bordered on the toxic and which has proven – so far, at least – to be beyond his skill to remedy.
Anyone who’s ever endured a workplace environment in which morale is low knows how hard it is to get the smell out of the proverbial furniture. It’s no different in a dressing room. The players who created the toxicity in the first place may have long been sold, but it lingers in new recruits that can’t help but get be caught up in it, passing it on to the players that follow. It takes a certain force of personality to blow the cobwebs away. That personality doesn’t usually sit on its haunches, averting its eyes.
It's hard not to think back to the days of Sir Alex Ferguson, a great manager not only because of his tactical acumen and coaching skill but because he knew how to get the best out of his players and his squad every week. Ferguson was not one to look away or to get downcast when things went awry, and the result was titles won with teams that didn’t always have much business being at the top of the table. Just look at the squad with which he won his final Premier League – it was nothing special on paper, but it was grimly focused on winning every weekend.
Ferguson lost his temper plenty and would complain bitterly and ceaselessly about everything from refereeing to the colour of his team’s shirts when things went south, but for all that he had a fine line in thin excuses for defeats, he always carried an aura of grim determination and an unwillingness to tolerate second best from his players. Amorim, by comparison, seems to bear every worry and every frustration like a weight across his shoulders.
Ryan Giggs once called Ferguson a “master of psychology” who was superb at “getting the best out of certain individuals… [knowing] whether to put an arm around [them], or whether to give them a rocket at half-time or at the end of the game or leave them out knowing that the player would react in a positive way.”
Amorim needs to find some of that energy and insight into the psychology of his own squad, both on a team-wide basis and on an individual level. After all, how many of United’s players have proven themselves to be fine players at other teams, only to shrink in stature at Old Trafford?
Was André Onana this error prone at Ajax? Joshua Zirkzee so limp at Bologna? Manuel Ugarte so listless at Sporting – under Amorim? There’s a common theme of perfectly good players wilting at a team that used to have the art of winning down to tee.
The blunt fact is that Amorim either finds some pages he can take out of Sir Alex Ferguson’s book – or takes a 2,300-year-old hint from Alexander of Macedon, perhaps – or his reign will end dismally, and likely quite soon. Pontificating about new signings or tactical tweaks will be pointless if the fundamental psychological damage done to this squad isn’t healed.
Nor will it matter who manages United in the future if they can’t find a way to do that same work. The foundations upon which United’s legend are built have crumbled, and there are more holes in this side’s sense of self-confidence than there are in Old Trafford’s roof. This is a team that can’t beat other Premier League sides, and can’t even do it on a wet Wednesday night in Cleethorpes. Buying Carlos Baleba won’t fix that. Switching a couple of players’ positions around won’t make a dent.
Amorim either becomes a manager who can watch his own team take penalties, or getting knocked out of the EFL Cup will quickly become the very least of their problems.
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