Laura Woods: United aren’t respected or feared like they once were

Ten Hag sacking was inevitable

I never like to see a manager lose his job, or call for it, but it’s clear to see it wasn’t working for Erik ten Hag at Manchester United anymore.

Results and performances were just bad this season and you can’t have a club as big as United sitting 14th in the Premier League at this stage of the campaign.

They’ve also spent a lot of money since he’s been at the club and it’s not been spent wisely. It now feels like another rebuild is due, to add to the last rebuild… and the rebuild before that.

Amorim a good fit for Manchester United

I like Ruben Amorim and I really hope he’s not sucked into the graveyard of managers United has become.

He’s pretty popular in Portugal, having only just made up with the Sporting CP fans for taking a meeting with West Ham over the summer!

But the number of other clubs he’s been linked with suggested it was only a matter of time before he packed his bags for a ‘bigger’ job. He joins with five of his staff, has a pretty defined playing style (high press, possession-based 3-4-3) and he champions youth so, all in all, it could be really good for United.

He certainly is more of what the new owners are looking for on the pitch and I think he’s cool too; likeable, young and exciting. He’s a football man through and through.

He brought Sporting some really good times, so let’s see what he can do at Old Trafford.

Free hit for rest of season?

Whatever criticism we had for Ten Hag, he did bring United two trophies.

Going again in the cups looks to be the only real route to proper success – but I don’t think it’s vital. There’s still time in the league to regain some sort of respectable finish and they absolutely have to do that.

Amorim has got a bit of a free hit this season, in my opinion. He’ll have to cut out the embarrassing losses, gain some identity on the pitch with a proper style of play that the fans can get behind, become hard to beat again and make some good signings in the next window to finish the season as strong as possible.

United fear factor no longer exists

I don’t think United are the benchmark – I fear their global popularity has taken quite a heavy hit lately.

They are still one of the most well-known clubs in the world but, at this moment in time, they aren’t respected or feared like they once were.

I haven’t felt that grandeur about United for a while. And while Manchester City, Liverpool and Arsenal are growing so much around them, they’re in danger of massively falling away further.

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