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Last weekend’s loss to West Ham marked the end of the Erik ten Hag era at Manchester United with INEOS forced to act as the club languished in 14th position in the Premier League table.
Ruud van Nistelrooy was placed in interim charge and the feeling was that the new co-owners would take time to find the former Ajax manager’s successor.
However, they conducted a swift deal for Sporting Lisbon’s Ruben Amorim who is expected to take charge on November 11 with his first game scheduled to be the game against Ipswich Town after the international break.
Under the Portuguese tactician, Sporting have won two league titles as well as two Taca da Liga cups and have a very attractive style of play with a recognizable identity throughout the whole squad.
Amorim has a huge challenge ahead of him
And that will be his biggest challenge at the Red Devils, who never had a proper style under Ten Hag with his tenure characterised by rigidity among players sand a chaotic mess while on the pitch.
While Van Nistelrooy had the perfect start, make no mistake, Amorim will have his task cut out at Old Trafford where plenty of big-name managers have failed to succeed in the aftermath of Sir Alex Ferguson’s retirement.
The man who was credited with giving Amorim his first managerial gig at Casa Pia, the club’s then-sporting director Carlos Pires felt the 39-year-old had a special quality in him despite his relative inexperience.
“If I saw that he was different, yes, that was obvious,” Pires was relayed as saying by O Jogo. “Now that, less than seven years later, he would be at Manchester United, I don’t think anyone could imagine it happening that quickly. It’s been a meteoric rise.
“If you ask me if the first time, I sat down with him I thought he would be special, I confess that I did. It’s a lot of credit to him. Nobody gave him anything.”
When he eventually joined Sporting, the club had not won the league in 19 years and were starved for success with plenty of managers coming and going without achieving the club’s ambitions.
United in a similar phase like Sporting
And therein lies the similarity, with Amorim expected to finally take United back to the promised land. And Pires feels he can handle the pressure which comes with taking over at The Theatre of Dreams.
“I see Manchester United a little like I saw Sporting at the time. At the time, many people would have thought that Sporting would be a coach’s cemetery, because it had been like that in recent years. United, at a different level, is in an identical situation.
“I think that, above all, it is good for Manchester United too because it seems to me that it is a tailor-made project for Rúben. It has everything to work out. It’s a risk, it’s always a risk, but Rúben also likes the risk. It seems to me to be a project that suits him.”
For now, Van Nistelrooy needs to carry on the winning momentum from the league cup and hopefully, the players keep responding and picking up the wins ahead of Amorim’s arrival.
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