Lighten up!
Ruben Amorim - Manchester United Head Coach
- Thread starter sewey89
- Start date
What's the point if you can't get excited about a new manager appointment? Might work out, might not but we can look forward to finding out!
top four should be the target next season and it think any good manager should be able to do it with these players + a few new faces, in my view
Would have ultimately meant they’d have to sign some players in the summer, which their owners probably weren’t willing to do cos they’re cheap as f**k.
In fairness, they were still doing well under Klopp so there wasn’t a need to radically change their system and opted for continuity, which so far is paying off although we’ll see how Slot does long term when he’s no longer living off Klopp’s squad and work.
Amorim seemed like the first person they went after though as statistically he was likely the top of their list of targets. In our case, we in dire need of radical change, on the pitch and the club / dressing room culture. Amorim, his staff and our new shiny footballing structure around SHOULD be able to implement that change.
Must be hella miserable. Might be recency bias but this is the most excited I’ve been about a manager since Van Gaal (and signing Di Maria).
It might be a good thing that a large portion of the fanbase thinks like you, despite what you are saying being far from the truth IMO.
This squad should be coming 4th or 5th on paper. It will ease the pressure on Amorim if he does just that this, or next season, and the fans praise him for it without setting unrealistic expectations for the following seasons.
What about his lack of control with possession, its not his strong point. How much does Amorim value possession control?
I had no idea our man Ruben worked at United for a week under Mourinho doing an internship.
Yes. He made the brews and brought in custard creams to appeal to Jose’s good nature.
Why are people writing off this season?
If we win today we are 4 points behind top 4 with 3 quarters of the season left to play. We are paying amorim to come in and improve us. There are plenty of examples of a new man coming in and reinvigorating the side. Hopefully he can have an impact relatively quickly.
Top 4 is still to play for if we can see an improvement on the pitch and potentially a bit of business in January with a couple out and a couple coming in.
If we win today we are 4 points behind top 4 with 3 quarters of the season left to play. We are paying amorim to come in and improve us. There are plenty of examples of a new man coming in and reinvigorating the side. Hopefully he can have an impact relatively quickly.
Top 4 is still to play for if we can see an improvement on the pitch and potentially a bit of business in January with a couple out and a couple coming in.
I am sorry if it's been discussed but will he be the one managing the team against Chelsea?
Nope, his first match is against Ipswich.
So we have a better squad/team than Spurs (lost 0-3), Villa, Chelsea, and Newcastle? I don't think so and we were 8th last season, just to back up my thinking.
That’s a very short sighted view in my opinion. We will see what Amorim can bring to the table.
Only Chelsea have better squad than United amongst the teams you have mentioned and i am fully expecting United to be there or there about in terms of top 4 come end of the season .
This season feels a lot more open, with top teams not looking as consistent and dropping points unexpectedly each week. Points tally’s will be lower, and generally things are going to feel tight throughout the season.
One things for sure, we can’t keep losing to our top 4 rivals, making today a massive game. Win and the season / top 4 suddenly looks to be back on. Lose and the table looks rather bleak and top 4 insurmountable.
Depressing the expectations to this extent is what saw Ten Hag keep his foot on our necks for so long. The squad needs some work but throwing around words like genius and miracle for top 4 next season or top 6 this season is quite an exaggeration.
We're at our lowest ebb right now. We don't have the quality for a title challenge but our squad is also nowhere near as bad as the league table suggests right now. The fact that Nottingham Forest are 3rd right now shows that you don't have to be some incredible team to achieve results in this league.
Yes, better squad than most of those teams.
Same here. Can't wait.
Every single one of those players had better seasons in the Championship than Gyokeres did, and I wouldn't want any of them at United.
Mitrovic, Wood and Toney would be banging in goals as the focal point and pen taker for the best team in the Portuguese league in just the same way.
No they didn't
Wood best Championship season: 27 goals.No they didn't
Pukki best Championship season: 29 goals.
Toney only Championship season: 31 goals.
Mitrovic best Championship season: 43 goals.
Gyokeres best Championship season: 21 goals.
I think we'll see him come out with a new system for the rest of the season. There seem to be too many square pegs in round holes even with a fully fit squad.
I hope that if he tries to set us up like Sporting that he's not too rigid to stick to it if we're getting beat each week.
I hope that if he tries to set us up like Sporting that he's not too rigid to stick to it if we're getting beat each week.
Goal output alone doesn't tell the full story. Especially with guys like Mitrovic or Pukki who played in very dominant and more free-scoring teams.
Toney is obviously just a good player and I agree probably was better that year, 31 goals and 10 assists.
Wood had 27 goals and 4 assists for Leeds which is quite similar to Gyokeres with 21 goals and 10 assists.
Gyokeres pretty much single-handedly dragged Coventry into that playoff final with 31 goal contributions (the team scored 58 overall) which in my opinion is just more impressive than the others. He was directly responsible for more than half of the goals the team scored that year (53%)
Thanks, but you are wrong about Martinez. He is the best ball playing cb we have hands down.Hello guys.
I'm a Sporting fan and I thought I might as well give you a little insight about Ruben's qualities and system.
First of all, the qualities: the guy is a phenomenal manager, for me one of the best coaches in Europe. You might laugh reading this, but forget the context (portuguese league), the curriculum (the titles he won in Portugal), all that. I don't say this because he won a lot in Portugal, i say this because of the way he develops and structures a team. And also because of the way he communicates, so clear and with such charisma that the fans will love them and the players will "buy" every single aspect of his idea. Because he is direct, clear, smart, it's easy to believe him. And that goes to the locker room as well.
I haven't seen many coaches with such a fingerprint, so clear and definied, as his on a team. You saw Sporting playing one week, and if you saw it the week before, and 2 weeks before, and 3 weeks before, you could the see pretty much the same. The tactical patterns are so clear, so well-worked and so structured that you see team's intentions - the construction from behind, the movements off the ball from the players and the paths used to get to the goal - repeatedly. He got to a point where Sporting fans pretty much knew what to expect before each game, and were confident with what they would see in the following game: such a dominance and tactical supremacy that everyone was calm and relaxed about the game before it started.
Of course, context matters, but I've seen many, many coaches in this context. Some have won as much as him (none in Sporting, and that's not a detail I would say), some have had good win percentagens, but very very few had this control over the game, the tactics. This year and last year, the impression one had was that the team would play exactly the same if all the players were blindfolded. It was so mechanized, so developed and for the players the proposal was so clear that the adjective I would is use fluid - every move, every action, every collective intent was so fluid.
In terms of the system, I would say:
Back three - This is how he always played. The center-back from the middle is someone who has to keep it simple. He has to have good control over the ball, he can't be sloppy and has to remain the calm and composure on the ball when he's pressed, but he has to pass it and play it simply. It's also important to have good aerial capabilities and be physically dominant. The center-backs from the sides have to do it a bit different. They have to have the best ball control possible, they have to feel confident and calm with the ball, be able to progress with it to open up spaces and create numerical advantages and they have to be able to keep doing good vertical passes. To say it simply, they have to be playmakers with the ball. I'm not sure about it's contractual situation, and its status currently on the team, but Lindelof would be a guy that could grow into a specific system like this. Dalot, also. Lisandro, I don't know - does he have the composure, creativity and vision with the ball to construct the plays from behind and for the team to be so "dependeable" on his playmaking with the ball? I guess we'll see.
The wing backs - Ruben had success with good offensive full-backs playing as wing-back, such as Porro and Nuno Mendes. But over the years, the system evolved so that the characteristics of the guys playing here changed. He started favouring "pure dribblers" here: normally small guys, but very fast, very good on the gear change and acceleration and specially (essential) very good 1x1 offensive skills. Guys like Diallo (on the right) and Garnacho (on the left), I would say, would play in these positions. Because everyone, from the midlefield to the attack, plays so much in central roles, these guys seem "abandoned" on the wing. It's on purpose: suddenly a colleague passes the ball on the wing and these guys have to have the shamelessness and technical and physical skills to crush the full-back 1x1.
Midlefield - Two guys, nothing much to say about it. He has used different kind of defensive midlefields (Palhinha and Ugarte are very different from Hjulmand, who is a calm playmaker) and different kind of central midlefields (Morita is very different from Bragança, he used Joao Mario also, but also Matheus Nunes, who has very different characteristics from the former 3). What will they need? Class and quality with the ball - the rest, Ruben will work with them on positioning, movements and confidence. Ugarte will thrive with him, I'm sure (he already has in Sporting).
Then, there's two essential positions, maybe the most important in his system: the "false wingers". They are not wingers, they play within the lines, in the interior areas, and they have to be a mix of a classical number 10 (with a great first touch, vision to assist and elegance) and a kind of interior winger (with dribble, gear chance, acceleration and capacity to finish and score). Check Trincao and Pote - those are the type of players that succeed in these system. Maybe Bruno can play here, with creative duties. But you'll also need a different type of player than Garnacho, Antony or Diallo, a guy comfortable with receiving the ball in interior areas, that great first touch and capacity to change the game and the attack with one/two touches. One example: Fatawu (Leicester) didn't thrive here because he was a player who liked to fix the oponent, wait and then trying to drible him. It has to be more "practical" players, with the quality, elegance and smartness to play well in central crowded spaces.
Attack - I personally believe Hojlund will thrive. Gyokeres is outstanding, but please don't take him away from us
Hope someone finds this insight helpful. Best to all!
PL is different to Portuguese league, so we will have to see how things go. I do think we appointed one of best coaches available.
Amorim values a lot possession control, but that his given by the way the team works, more than by one player individually. And the players that individually need the most are the two CM.
The 2 CAM/#10 need an excellent first touch and direct passing, to create space and serve the striker and to be able to use the space the strikers movement will create in the defence. Usually one is more cerebral (Pote in Sporting, maybe Bruno in MU) and the other more able to carry the ball dribling (Trincão in Sporting and maybe Garnacho in MU)
That Coventry side, while worse defensively, scored 70 goals the season after Gyokeres left after they scored 58 with him, so how much could he have really been carrying their attack?
I'm not saying he isn't at that Toney/Wood/Mitro level, he probably is, there's just nothing to show that he's clearly better than those guys either from what he produced in the Championship or from him cashing in on defensive gift after defensive gift in the Portuguese league like we saw on Friday, and like a parade of bang average strikers have done before him - and he'd have to be clearly above those guys to be a marquee striker signing for Man Utd.
Agree to disagree man, it's not that deep.
That Sporting fan who gave us this Reddit review on Bruno when he first joined that made the rounds within the fanbase
Also just gave his 2 cents on Amorim
Also just gave his 2 cents on Amorim
Enjoy the journey mate, it will be all the much better when we are competing with the big boys again. It's coming with the new people in charge and hiring a manager like Amorim, it will take a while but we will get there.
My biggest question is how much does he value set pieces? For example we are obviously terrible. Arsenal are the best.
Was there an emphasis on set pieces at sporting under him?
@Sly @JoaoFM @goncaloc10
Appreciate any replies
Was there an emphasis on set pieces at sporting under him?
@Sly @JoaoFM @goncaloc10
Appreciate any replies
Fraud may not be the word, but I understand the line of thinking.
I don't think he was anywhere near as good of a manager as fans and the media would like to think. Him being Dutch and the idea of the country as a whole being full of total football wizards painted a picture of him being a tactical genius. He was quite the opposite of that, and this was clear from a lot of decisions he made and his failure to stop specific tactical flaws for elongated periods. He was clearly out of his depth. Yet unlike Moyes and Ole, he gets treated like the club were the ones to limit his abilities. Once fans start realizing, that outside of transfers, the owners and senior executives, have no influence on the pitch, they will start looking at where the on pitch issues have always lied - the people we hire as managers.
Retrospectively, the system Ten Hag employed with Ajax was very unique....it took a lot of risk and required such a level of superiority that it was clear it couldn't be replicated in hindsight. You had players like Timber and Mazraoui, centre backs who were fluid and constantly out of position, Daley Blind being a sort of playmaking defender, and players having the time and space to overload the opposition from the weirdest positions. Timber and Lisandro were undersized centre backs yet still faced little pressure. Ajax also didn't actually keep possession through a reduced tempo like most teams, they were able to maintain high possession numbers through playing high and having the physical superiority to regain possession when lost due to easily winning one on one duels. Despite how fluid their backline was, teams did not have the speed or power to take advantage of their weird distribution of numbers, so on appearance, with the risk Ten Hag took, it looked attractive, but in reality, his system could not work in any competitive league, and more specifically, a league as physical and intense as the Premier League.
At United, particularly from last season onwards, his lack of tactical acumen got exposed, as his inability to react to situations on the pitch became apparent. Some fans would limit this to in-game management, but overall I actually think its a reflection of his full tactical inadequacies. My takeaway, especially from last season, was that he didn't actually know how to tweak the system to make it effective. He can follow a recipe, but I don't think he knows how to cook. Which is why in the Premier League, he could provide us with the shape, movements and formation, but couldn't adapt when the recipe given to him didn't work in the premier league environment.
In comparison, Amorim's system seems a lot more simple and adaptable. Its quite clear what the route to goal is, and it doesn't rely on extraordinary features, such the heavy overlaods ETH's system required, in order to get goals. The defensive set up is also easy to understand and doesn't require moments of fluidity to be effective. On paper, this makes it adaptable to the Premier League. The big lesson with Ten Hag is that Dutch managers reliance on fluidity and their stubbornness toward their tactical principals is not conducive to the intense and physical nature of the premier league, that requires quick action. To adapt to that reality, managers who focus on fluidity, need to be able to adapt their tactics to make it conducive to the league, which are the steps that both Pep and Arteta have taken. Pep with his inverted full backs, Arteta by using centre backs at full back and by ensuring his wingers act almost like wing backs in their tracking back. United were so dominant for so many years due to having simple tactical principles that were suited to the pace and intensity of the premier league. I think Amorim coming in, with INEOS supporting him, will allow us to get back to that.
It certainly seemed that way
Obviously I'm joking, but a Liverpool fan could have come in and sabotage us less.
Brilliant post, and I wholeheartedly agree.
I believe it won’t be long for us to be looking like a well coached team under Amorim, and it will really highlight how badly coached we were prior to his arrival.
So he could end this season with 2 league winners medals. Amazing.
@romufc Continuing our conversation from the previous thread. Your post...
"You undervalue our squad... That is what a coaches job is though, squeeze the best from the squad.
I have not said its a great squad, its a very good one though. Our defence is good, you talk about a rapidly aging midfield? Mainoo is ageing? Ugarte is ageing? Mount is ageing? Our oldest midfielder is 32... and you are talking about it being an aged midfield?
Our front line has issues but its got talent in there.. Amad, Garnacho, Rashford, Hojlund are all there, they just need a coach to allow them to get into positions to score.
If you think the consistent, go have a look at Hojlund's conversion rate since he has been here compare to every other ST in the PL."
Yes, we have a rapidly aging midfield. You just happened to leave out Bruno, Eriksen, and Casemiro from your list...two of which our or most played midfielders. Yes, Mainoo is a great guy to build around. Ugarte may turn out to be a great player for us but is very much an unknown still. Mount is laughable to list. He's barely played for us and when he has played hes been awful at everything besides pressing. We need to be thinking about a Bruno replacement and a partner for Mainoo (or cover if Ugarte succeeds) sooner rather than later.
Defense is good, but we have a gaping hole on the left side. We arguably need to sign two left backs this summer unless Amass proves hes ready to step up. Shaw and Malacia shouldn't even be considered in future plans.
I fully disagree regarding our front line. Are they talented? Yes. Are they finishers? No. Only Rashford has any sort of scoring pedigree and that only shows its face every 1/4 seasons. Hojlund has a great conversion rate, but we won't know if that holds true when his chances go up. And he needs to start creating for himself some unless hes going to be a Ruud like box poacher. And I dont think his movement around the box is good enough to be that guy. As for talent levels in our front line...are they better than any of the top 4-6 teams? Definitely not.
Im not saying our squad is shit. Im saying we are at least 2 summers from being a squad that should finish top 4 comfortably. And by that time, a huge part of our identity (Bruno) should be getting phased out. Its going to be a difficult task for Amorim.
"You undervalue our squad... That is what a coaches job is though, squeeze the best from the squad.
I have not said its a great squad, its a very good one though. Our defence is good, you talk about a rapidly aging midfield? Mainoo is ageing? Ugarte is ageing? Mount is ageing? Our oldest midfielder is 32... and you are talking about it being an aged midfield?
Our front line has issues but its got talent in there.. Amad, Garnacho, Rashford, Hojlund are all there, they just need a coach to allow them to get into positions to score.
If you think the consistent, go have a look at Hojlund's conversion rate since he has been here compare to every other ST in the PL."
Yes, we have a rapidly aging midfield. You just happened to leave out Bruno, Eriksen, and Casemiro from your list...two of which our or most played midfielders. Yes, Mainoo is a great guy to build around. Ugarte may turn out to be a great player for us but is very much an unknown still. Mount is laughable to list. He's barely played for us and when he has played hes been awful at everything besides pressing. We need to be thinking about a Bruno replacement and a partner for Mainoo (or cover if Ugarte succeeds) sooner rather than later.
Defense is good, but we have a gaping hole on the left side. We arguably need to sign two left backs this summer unless Amass proves hes ready to step up. Shaw and Malacia shouldn't even be considered in future plans.
I fully disagree regarding our front line. Are they talented? Yes. Are they finishers? No. Only Rashford has any sort of scoring pedigree and that only shows its face every 1/4 seasons. Hojlund has a great conversion rate, but we won't know if that holds true when his chances go up. And he needs to start creating for himself some unless hes going to be a Ruud like box poacher. And I dont think his movement around the box is good enough to be that guy. As for talent levels in our front line...are they better than any of the top 4-6 teams? Definitely not.
Im not saying our squad is shit. Im saying we are at least 2 summers from being a squad that should finish top 4 comfortably. And by that time, a huge part of our identity (Bruno) should be getting phased out. Its going to be a difficult task for Amorim.
Cant wait to see the much taked about 3 4 3 formation that he is going to use. I personally think a 35 2 would suite us more.the reason being
one of our glaring fault is the midfield and in a 3 4 3 formation we normally play two midfielders and we are even struggling with 3 midfielders and can be fatal but in 3 5 2 we can play 3 midfielders and two attakers and we can sacrifice one of the wing players . None of the three attackers score anyway
one of our glaring fault is the midfield and in a 3 4 3 formation we normally play two midfielders and we are even struggling with 3 midfielders and can be fatal but in 3 5 2 we can play 3 midfielders and two attakers and we can sacrifice one of the wing players . None of the three attackers score anyway
He’ll be watching this closely
Let's hope he can bring in some sort of cohesion in this lot. I hold out a bit of hope for him as he's young and Hungry otherwise this lot could throw another guy under the bus.