All is not well at Manchester United, with Saturday afternoon’s defeat at the Gtech against Brentford keeping Ruben Amorim on nine lowly Premier League wins across 33 matches in the competition.
It’s not good enough, and the ice has worn thin indeed. For INEOS to sack their prized appointment would be an ignominious thing, a real loss of face, but we are approaching the latest critical juncture, and it’s a big one.
Amorim’s candid nature and self-criticism have been both refreshing and blunt, too blunt, across the span of his tenure, but he is capable of picking apart the faults within his Red Devils project. The question is, how much longer can this continue?
Man United host high-flying Sunderland this weekend. The newly-promoted outfit simply have to be put to the sword, else Amorim will join a long list of post-Fergie managers whose tenures became untenable, and they were dismissed.
Already, rumours have cranked up, with the recently sacked West Ham United manager Graham Potter emerging as a candidate. That said, he’s not the only one on their radar.
Man Utd considering recently sacked manager
Potter lasted less than a year in the West Ham hot seat. The Londoners have been in disarray since they parted with David Moyes after the 2023/24 campaign, but there’s no denying the English tactician left plenty to be desired.
Clashes with first-team Irons, including a scepticism over captain Jarrod Bowen’s ability to lead the team, made the 50-year-old’s prospects of turning things around difficult.
Potter is, however, an experienced Premier League manager, something Amorim is not. Described as “a genius” by journalist Sam Morton, the former Brighton & Hove Albion and Chelsea boss is known for his intricate passing patterns and build-up play, but this didn’t materialise in the desired shape at the London Stadium.
West Ham
24 (01/25 – 09/25)
0.92
Chelsea
31 (09/22 – 04/23)
1.42
Brighton
134 (05/19 – 09/22)
1.28
Swansea
51 (07/18 – 05/19)
1.45
Potter would hope, however, that an ostensibly higher level of technical skill would do the trick at Old Trafford, but there are bound to be reservations over a manager who has failed to hit the mark with each of his past two outfits in the top flight.
Spanish sources suggest INEOS and Jason Wilcox are mulling over making their move if Amorim is sacked, and while it would be a contentious appointment, there’s an even more concerning alternative who has been added to the shortlist.
Man Utd's Potter alternative could be worse than Amorim
Even the most ardent defenders of Amorim’s tactics and expertise as an elite coach would concede that it has been a tumultuous relationship.
And now, the Portuguese boss is running out of time, surely just one or perhaps two bad results away from dismissal, should form not change.
And if push comes to shove, it’s not just Potter on Man United’s radar, with talkSPORT revealing that a three-man shortlist has been compiled, and former Three Lions manager Sir Gareth Southgate is in the running.
It’s actually understood that the Premier League side have been in direct contact with the 55-year-old in recent weeks, even with the hierarchy hesitant to bite the bullet and sack Amorim.
Southgate transformed the feeling around the England Men’s team across his eight-year stint, reaching a World Cup semi-final and falling short in successive Euro finals. Across 102 matches in charge, he achieved an average of 2.08 points per game.
However, there have long been questions over Southgate’s command of the technical side of managing, with former French World Cup winner Emmanuel Petit even labelling the one-time right-back as “boring”.
Given that Man United are engulfed in Groundhog Day, walking in the same old familiar territory in the early phase of a season that saw Erik ten Hag dismissed last year (bearing an identical Premier League record after six matches), there can be no more mistakes.
At the 2024 European Championship, England showed off their mentality by reaching the final against the odds, but they flattered to deceive on the tactical front, with critics even struggling to understand what Southgate’s plan was.
This sounds an alarming echo to Amorim’s own situation at Manchester United, and given that Southgate, who parted ways with Middlesbrough in 2009, has been outside of club management for so long, there is very little to suggest that he would turn the ship around and keep it afloat against the club’s big-hitting rivals in the Premier League.
Typically fielding a more conventional 4-3-3 formation than Amorim’s controversial set-up, Southgate would at least provide some semblance of typicality on that front, and that might do the players good. But would it be enough for it to be a successful appointment, and that after having spent £12m to relieve Amorim of his duties?
Southgate has his perks, for sure. He knows the English game like the back of his thumb, and his man-management skills and ability to cultivate a positive working environment are two facets that would potentially smooth out big wrinkles in the United fabric.
But we cannot ignore the concerns over the depth of his tactical understanding, nor can Southgate’s near two-decade absence from Premier League management be overlooked.
If Sir Jim Ratcliffe and co do decide to part ways with Amorim in the coming weeks or months, it is imperative that they welcome the right successor to the Theatre of Dreams.
The likelihood of Southgate being the one for the job in the long run feels somewhat slim.
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