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Ryan O’Hanlon
about a year ago, Manchester United Eric ten Hag was fired… just a few months after As a result of a month-long review the club opted to retain Ten Hag as manager. United had just lost to West Ham, 2-1,
ESPN’s Rob Dawson wrote, “Sources told ESPN that United owners took the decision to fire Ten Hag because they had lost confidence that the Dutchman would be able to turn things around after a poor start to the new campaign.” in those days“Having earned only 11 points from nine league games, there are already concerns that United are a long way off qualifying for next season’s Champions League,”
United finished eighth last season and are 14th. Then, they hired Ruben Amorim and ultimately finished the previous season in 15th place.
His per-game points dropped from 1.2 under Ten Hag to 1.0 under Amorim, as did his per-game goal differential: from minus-0.3, to minus-0.4. Despite a string of performances worse than the level that would have required the sacking of the previous manager, United stuck to their man.
It looked like it might finally be paying off as they went on a five-game unbeaten run in all competitions through October and November – until they lost, 1-0at home on Monday evertonWho played a man down for more than 75 minutes.
After 12 games, Manchester United are in a four-way tie for 10th place. It’s been a year and a day since Amorim played his first game with United – he’s played a whole season’s worth of matches Premier League Milan and then another. And so, a question: Is Manchester United better than they were a year ago?
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What has changed at United under Ruben Amorim?
Tactical formations are mostly meaningless: one man’s 4-3-3 is another man’s 4-2-3-1, ultimately another man’s 3-4-3. But with Amorim, it’s impossible to disentangle his ideas about how to play the game and the number one number in that formative shorthand.
When United were struggling he said, “I won’t change my philosophy.” on September“If they [United hierarchy] If you want to change it, you change that person.”
According to Stats Perform, Amorim has started all 39 United matches with a 3-4-3 or 3-4-2-1 formation. Since the beginning of last season, only crystal Palace Manager Oliver Glasner often sticks to a back-three defence:
While the formation of the Amorim has remained the same and they claim that their philosophy will never change… well, Some? There has been a change this season. Last year, Amorim United’s defining characteristic was how slow and ineffective they were with the ball.
After Amorim took over, United moved the ball up the field at an average pace of 0.98 meters per second – the second slowest mark in the league. Manchester CityUnlike City, they weren’t slowing things down once they entered the attacking third; No, they were mostly recycling the ball in their own half,
Generally, you can play slowly and dominate the field or play fast and let the ball get into your third a little more often – either can be effective. If you can play fast and dominate the field, then congratulations, you are probably on a team managed by Jurgen Klopp or Arne Slott. But if you don’t dominate the field and you don’t play fast, you won’t win many football games.
Incidentally, as you’ll see in this graph comparing pace of play with final-third possession, last season’s two relegated teams fell into the slow and non-dominant quadrant, as did West Ham and Wolves, two of this season’s most likely relegation candidates. Amorim’s United were also dangerously close to relegation there.
However, this is no longer true this season. Here’s the same chart for the first 12 games of this year:
Amorim’s team are still controlling almost the same amount of territory, but they are doing so with a much more dynamic approach with the ball. And the team has become much better because of it. Through 12 games, they are scoring an average of 0.5 more points per match, compared to 27 under Amorim in 2024-25, and their goal difference has improved by 0.4 points per game. Over the entire season, that’s approximately 19 more points and a 15-goal difference improvement.
How much better are they? And how sustainable is the recovery?
We’ll start with their adjusted goal difference, a mix of 70% expected goals and 30% goals against. According to this performance metric, they are a mirror image of last season – in a good way. Last year under Amorim, their adjusted goal difference was minus 0.16. This year it is up to plus-0.20. Through 12 games, that’s good enough for seventh-best in the league.
Looking at the offensive end, his adjusted goals per game are 1.67, up from 1.29 per game under Amorim last season. On the other side of the field, their adjusted goals conceded has become even worse, from 1.45 to 1.46.
However, the small compromise has been worth it. Being less conservative on the ball, this has made United more vulnerable defensively, but it has also increased attacking play to an even greater extent.
Finding the appropriate balance for these trade-offs and then actually implementing them on the field is what coaching is all about, and Amorim has shown improvement from one year to the next. This is one of the benefits of hiring a young manager; They can improve just like young players do.
Of course, it is impossible to separate Amorim’s coaching from the performance of the players he is coaching. And the big difference this season compared to last season is that United’s forwards are all different.
Brian Mbeumo Whereas, have played almost every minute of every game mattheus cunha And benjamin cesco They have had injury problems but each of them has started at least half the matches. United are a better team this season because they are better in attacking this season. And the simplest explanation for why they’re better at attacking: They have a bunch of new attackers.
Now, does Amorim deserve credit for changing the way United play?
One area where you can dial in to tactical decisions and say “this is on purpose, not just an artifact of decisions made by all the players” is on goal kicks. And United are taking two-thirds of their goal kicks long this season, compared to 45% last season.
Their goalkeepers are also taking non-goal kicks 60% of the time, almost double last season’s rate of 32%. Some of them are due to Andrea-Pirlo being andre onana No longer on target, but it dovetails very well with the general change in approach. It seems that all this is happening deliberately.
But will it last?
Many things have gone in United’s favor so far this season.
First: They went ahead by one person in the fifth minute chelseaAbsolutely, casemiro Then they were sent off at the end of the half, but they were already 2-0 up and yet they had the advantage of suddenly playing against more tired opposition on a much larger field at 10 vs. 10, and won.
And then, against Everton, Idrissa Gueye Caught his own teammate and United had to play with one man for 80 minutes. Sure, they lost, but they’ve spent a lot of time against 10 men this season, and that’s allowed them to get shots and expected goals that they otherwise wouldn’t have been able to.
Furthermore, he has also won three penalties and conceded zero. Although penalties are not completely random, United are currently on pace to finish the season with nine or 10 penalties won and zero against.
That’s very unlikely to happen, and if we remove the penalty from the adjusted numbers we’ve already touched on, their odds reduce to plus-0.04. In the nine games in which Ten Hag was sent off last season, United were at plus-0.01. Looking at all of United’s minutes this season with one additional player, it would be fair to say that they are playing at roughly the same level as when Amorim joined the club.
The big question facing United and their manager is whether he will continue to improve? Things are in a much better place than at the end of last season, but that’s mainly because the team was even worse under Amorim than at Ten Hag last season.
With a dogged coach like Amorim, there’s certainly an argument to be made that you need to get worse to get better. I wrote about this When they hired him: Maybe he’ll have trouble when he tries to implement his ideas, but that doesn’t mean there won’t be long-term benefits.
However, based on the evidence, I still don’t think I would entrust my club to such a manager, although he has shown some ability to develop, he still requires a very specific group of players to play in his preferred formation. It is unlikely that United’s next coach will also want to use wingbacks, three centre-backs and two pinch-in attacking midfielder-types instead of wingers.
There hasn’t been enough improvement — especially when you try to separate personnel changes from actual manager-driven gains — to say that reshaping the team is justified in Amorim’s vision. This is especially true when doing so means you’ll have to reshape the team if it doesn’t work.
The other thing that would give me pause is that making the team older has been a huge improvement. Both starting midfielders, Casemiro and bruno fernandesHis age is around 30. Mbeumo and Cunha are both at their peak. The average age of United’s squad last season, when measured by minutes played, was 25.5 years; This season it is up to 26.5. This makes United the older of the two armory and Manchester City; The current roster is a win-now type of roster, and this team is still nowhere close to winning.
Plus, they had a tough schedule to start the season. They still do not play in any of the projected top four (Arsenal, City, Chelsea, and liverpool) until mid-January, when they play City and Arsenal on back-to-back weekends. They could go on a run, and things could get better even without their performance being spiked by penalties and red cards.
Ultimately, however, Amorim deserve some credit. He’s taken United to a place I can’t really remember. They’re not a complete disaster, where everything is on fire every weekend and everyone’s job is at risk. And they aren’t convincing anyone that Manchester United are indeed back, ready to challenge for the major trophies they always used to win.
Manchester United is neither good nor bad now. What Amorim has made of them is average.
