Jamie Jackson’s match report has landed, so that’s my cue to go and find a piece of cheese. Thanks for your company, correspondence and views on the riddle that is Ruben Amorim.
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“Could Zirkzee,” wonders David Wall, “become United’s equivalent of Darwin Nunez at Liverpool? No one is sure if they’re actually that good but they so often make an impact.” It’s a good line, but Nunez may not be too thrilled. Zirkzee has only done it twice for United as far as I can remember – the other being against Fulham on the first night of the season, ie about six months ago. His goals against Everton were more like the cherries on the top of a cake that had been baked, or at least put in the oven, by Marcus Rashford.
“Very good team performance,” Ruud adds. “Off the ball, good pressing – on the ball, very stable. Deserved to go 1-0 up into half-time… So we deserved to go into extra time and maybe penalties. Decisions like this in our level are hard to swallow.”
And here’s Ruud van Nistelrooy, with a headline waiting to happen. “We are not defeated in Fergie time,” he fumes. “We are defeated in offside time.”
“We have to believe it until the end,” says Ruben Amorim, “but this game has nothing to do with the time of Fergie. The performance, we have to do so much better. We didn’t have any energy in the beginning. Then in the second half we play a little bit better, with a little bit more speed, and then we manage to turn things around. So [it] was a good result, not a good performance.”
Is it the players, he is asked, is it the system, is it the coach? “It’s everything. And the coach is responsible.”
Why is Ruben Amorim like Erik ten Hag? Because he’s better in the cups. He now has five wins in seven cup games, plus the shoot-out triumph at Arsenal, so just the one defeat (at Spurs in the Carabao). In the league, as you know, he has lost seven out of 13. And lately, whatever the tournament, the home wins have been less than convincing – United were 1-0 down to Southampton and 1-0 down to Leicester.
This is nice.
A great advert for xG pic.twitter.com/FMJYUkMwr7
— The xG Philosophy (@xGPhilosophy) February 7, 2025
Leicester will wonder how on earth they lost that game. And their answer may be: because the linesman, who was in the right place, didn’t see that Maguire was offside.
“The first half was nowhere near good enough,” Harry Maguire says. “The second half was a lot better… quicker tempo, we dominated the game.” He agrees that Garnacho was the game-changer, but mentions Zirkzee too. “I thought he had a big impact.”
Asked why United so often need this kind of late swing, he says: “Our record at Old Trafford’s been really poor. We lose that belief and it shows… Where we are in the Premier League is nowhere near good enough.”
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Leicester were clearly the better team in the first half and had a lead to show for it. But they wilted after that, allowing United to dominate in a way that they hadn’t done since Everton were at Old Trafford, back in the days when Ruben Amorim was still enjoying his new job.
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“Not a handball,” says Hugh Molloy, “and obviously offside. VAR anyone?”
FULL TIME! Man United 2-1 Leicester
Ruud van Nistelrooy finally loses a game at Old Trafford as a manager.
Maguire was offside, but with no VAR he will get away with it. Fernandes went long and Maguire’s wise old head did the rest, angling the header down and across Hermansen. It’s no way to treat your old team, but that’s Fergie time.
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GOAL!!! United 2-1 Leicester (Maguire 90+3)
And they’ve done it!
90+3 min Justin handles the ball as Garnacho bears down again. Last chance for United …
90+2 min Fernandes takes route one, looking for Hojlund, who can’t give the centre-backs the slip.
90 min There will be three more minutes. Only three?
90 min United pile forward again. Garnacho has James Justin on toast, but he can’t quite find the jam.
89 min We appear to be heading for extra time. “Following on from Jamie Woods’ email,” says Andy Flintoff, “inverted wingers are great when paired with full-backs or other wide players to go outside them and overload the full-back areas. Without them, they just end up in the congested centre and are easier to defend narrowly against. I’m sure Hojlund would prefer to be attacking a cross coming in from the byline rather than from the corner of the penalty area.”
87 min Leicester are under siege again, but they may not mind that. Garnacho has a shot – straight at Hermansen, who gathers easily enough.
85 min Dalot produces a great run, but not a great cross. United fans may have heard this before.
83 min Ugarte jumps in with both feet on Winks and gets a yellow card. There’s no VAR till the fifth round, so he won’t see red (at least not yet).
82 min After that spell of United dominance, the game has gone back to being scrappy.
79 min Big chance for Garnacho, and a big miss! With the goal beckoning, he skews his shot into the side netting from about five yards. His finishing has been awry ever since Amorim stuck him on the naughty step with Rashford, seven long weeks ago.
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78 min De Cordova-Reid , who set this game alight with his neat header, has now gone off, to be replaced by Kasey McAteer.
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77 min The corner almost produces a chance at the other end as El Khannouss bombs away on the counter, but Mazraoui comes up with a very well-timed tackle.
76 min Garnacho makes yet another run and plays a cut-back to nobody. Undaunted, he tries again and wins a corner.
74 min Amad takes a leaf out of Garnacho’s book and bombs into the box. He reaches the byline and finds a cut-back, but Hojlund is crowded out.
72 min Ruben Amorim gets a chunk of credit for turning to Zirkzee, who hadn’t scored (from memory) since mid-December, when United conjured three late goals at Spurs and still lost 4-3.
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70 min United are on top now, at last. Maguire is aiming long down the left. He finds Dalot, who slips the ball inside to Garnacho, but his shot is into Row Z (for Zirkzee).
That was much better from United. Garnacho drove into the box and squared for Hojlund. His shot was blocked but the ball fell kindly for Zirkzee, who was just behind him and produced a nice calm pass into the net.
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GOAL!! United 1-1 Leicester (Zirkzee 68)
United have a shot on target. And it’s only gone in!
65 min Just before that, United sent on a sub: ZIrkzee for Mainoo. So much for that hymn book.
64 min Big chance! Garnacho breaks free again, chips the keeper… and sees Okoli clear off the line and onto the bar. Fabulous defending.
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61 min Garnacho has aded a spark up front, but United’s midfield still seems as if it’s barely there. Fernandes, their best player, is part of the problem, because he loves to go for a wander and Amorim’s system just isn’t built for that.
60 min … on come Harry Winks and Woyo Coulibaly, the French full-back who was Leicester’s only signing in the January window.
58 min Subs! For Leicester. Off go Ndidi, who played a big part in the goal, and Thomas, who was lively…
56 min Garnacho makes another of those stirring runs of his. The crowd, again, are stirred: they are clearly delighted that United failed with their lame attempt to sell him.
55 min “I don’t mind this 5221 formation,” says Jamie Woods. “Away, or against top teams, it seems to work. But at home, against ‘weaker’ opposition, it needs to be either an aggressive 3421 or 352, with proper wingers, not Diogo Dalot (bless him, he tries). But we don’t seem to have any of those left....
“Oh to have a left-footer on the left and a right-footer on the right. So much more incisive. So much more (dare I say) fun.”
54 min Mazraoui tries to make amends with a long shot, which curls wide.Before that Mainoo did well to burst into the box. He is now at inside-right, which allows him to link up with Amad. They seem to be among the few United players using the same hymn book.
52 min Noussair Mazraoui takes a throw-in and gets penalised for a foul throw. This allows Luke Thomas to take a long one but United clear easily enough.
50 min El Khannouss has a shot, just wide of the far post. He may have been unable to believe how much time United gave him.
47 min Garnacho goes on a run down the left of the kind once supplied by Marcus Rashford. He can’t find a red shirt with his cross, but at least he gets the crowd showing some signs of life.
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46 min Leicester kick off and enjoy some possession, which ends with a poor long ball.
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Amorim seems to have responded with two moves. One is to send United out early, to wallow in their embarrassment. The other is to replace Patrick Dorgu with Alejandro Garnacho, so presumably Amad is going to right wing-back.
According to expected goals, the scoreline doesn’t lie. Leicester have exactly 1 xG, United 0.04.
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Both teams have played 274 passes. But in terms of shots on target, it’s 3-0 to Leicester, who have been more purposeful than United.
This fixture has now been played two and a half times this season, and the aggregate score is 9-2 to Ruud van Nistelrooy. He knew how to get United to win home games; Ruben Amorim seems to have forgotten already.
“I’m enjoying the MBM so far!” says Matthew Turner, sportingly. “In Lee Dixon’s defence, the modern world is kind of rubbish. I’m happy to elaborate if you have a few minutes.”
HALF-TIME United 0-1 Leicester
Exit Amorim, pursued by some boos.
Ugarte lost the ball in a dangerous area, El Khannouss played a neat square cross or cut-back, and all Nidid had to do was side-foot the ball into the net. He didn’t manage it, but the ball popped up and De Cordova-Reid reacted first to nod it in. “No one goes with him,” says Dixon. That’s the sixth time in seven home games that United have gone 1-0 down.
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GOAL! Man United 0-1 Leicester (De Cordova-Reid 42)
Here they go.
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40 min Yoro sends a long pass forward, looking for Hojlund, who is about ten yards behind where the ball lands.
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39 min James Justin goes storming up the field, but, you’ve guessed it, nothing comes of it.
36 min Mads Hermansen nearly scores an own goal! He fumbles Amad’s corner, under pressure from Maguire, and almost drops it over the line.
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36 min Leny Yoro steps out of defence, Martinez-style, and wins the ball. He pokes it forward to Mainoo … who pokes it back again. The crowd groan. But then United do get forward and after some patient passing they win a corner.
34 min We interrupt this non-event to bring you an email. “What’s a big club?” asks Tim Stappard. “Sporting could win the league especially if beat Porto tonight and are in the champs league knock-out stages, which is better than Utd have done for a while. So Sporting is a big club and anyone who says they aren’t have little knowledge if European football.
“Anyway I’m a Utd fan and the board are responsible for forcing him to leave when he didn’t ideally want to, causing problems everywhere.” He could have said no!
33 min United counter and Bruno Fernandes plays a peach of a pass, out to Amad on the right. He finds Kobbie Mainoo, who can’t sort his feet out.
31 min The corner is a good one, giving United the chance to show how shaky they are against set-pieces.
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30 min United, who are contractually required to score no goals in the first half, are now two-thirds of the way there. And they’ve just conceded a corner, thanks to a fine cross from Luke Thomas.
29 min Ndidi slides into Mazraoui and hears the whistle, much to his indignation.
28 min It feels as if Leicester have a goal in them and it could well be made by Jordan Ayew, who has looked the man most likely to make something happen (apart from Dorgu). But they could do with keeping the ball better.
26 min Bobby De Cordova-Reid gets into the box down the right and hits a cross-or-shot over the bar.
24 min Another United free kick. Fernandes haas another trick up his sleeve, trying to release Hojlund, whose considerable speed is not quite enough to make it work.
23 min United are now encamped in Leicester’s half for the first time. The cameras find Ruben Amorim throwing up his hands in horror at something or other.
21 min Amad and Fernandes stand over the ball, and then spring a surprise – Fernandes passes sideways, Amad shoots… but a deflection takes the ball way over the bar. From the resulting corner, the ball comes loose and Amad back-heels to Dorgu, who shoots with his right (and weaker) foot – also over the top, but more promising.
19 min Hojlund does well to hold the ball up and feed Amad on the right. He dances inside and then plays a reverse pass to Dorgu, who wins a free kick.
17 min Dorgu, the only bright spot for United so far, suddenly finds himself in acres on the right, but can’t use the time he has to pass to a team-mate. United do get a corner, which Amad messes up.
15 min “They’re very comfortable at the moment, Leicester,” says Lee Dixon. He has now spent 15 minutes sounding like that guy in the pub who is unimpressed with everything about the modern world.
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14 min The kick doesn’t reach the heads waiting for it, and now it’s Leicester’s turn to struggle in the face of the press. United win the ball but can’t do much with it.
13 min Free kick to Leicester, 40 yards out.
12 min The Leicester press pens United into their own third – not the hardest thing to do these days. Dalot tries to escape with a Rooney-style switch but he just gives the ball away.
9 min United get a jolt of life from Dorgu, who barrels into the box. Nothing comes of it, but you can see why Amorim has thrown him straight in.
8 min Like Ndidi, Luke Thomas has started brightly for Leicester. They look as if they’ve forgotten all about that week in November when they leaked eight goals here.
6 min A shot! Jordan Ayew hits a would-be screamer and it’s on target, but Andre Onana catches it easily enough. Daka had done well, out-sprinting Harry Maguire and then laying it off.
5 min Manuel Ugarte nicks the ball in the inside-right channel .. only to give it away again. Wilfred Ndidi, back from injury, has already added some bite to Leicester’s midfield.
4 min Leicester’s turn to ping it around at the back. They do better and get forward down the right, with Patson Daka popping up on the wing, but United push them back in the end.
2 min United give away a free kick on their right. The offender is the new boy Patrick Dorgu, who is at right wing-back, not left as expected. Diogo Dalot stays on the other side for now.
1 min Play gets under way with a familiar sight: United passing it sideways at the back.
Ruud van Nistelrooy strides along the touchline with the same confidence he showed last time he did it (which was against Leicester). The Bobby Charlton stand gives him a warm hand.
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“Evening Tim,” says Gary J Byrne. “Will Ruud van Nistelrooy have a case of the Steve Bruces on his return to Old Trafford?”
“Sorry, and I am almost certainly wrong,” says Brendan Large, “but... how does Martinez deserve a shirt for missing the rest of the season? How many full seasons has he played... how many games in a row. He has been good but has struggled to be on the pitch.
“Might this be the club searching for #likes or #engagement or #anythingpositivethatcanbeconnectedtotheclub???”
An email from Cleveland, Ohio. “I enjoy your newsletter,” says Rob Hisnay. “You are one of the few who writes the truth about Ruben Amoron. The downfall of MUFC continues.” Thanks! Though that word ending seems a little harsh.
In case anyone’s wondering what the hell Rob is referring to, it’s a Substack site called United Writing which I founded in 2021 with Rob Smyth. And yes, it may occasionally have expressed doubt about Amorim’s preferred formation.
A nice touch from the United players, giving a shout-out to Lisandro Martinez, who will miss the rest of the season with a cruciate-ligament injury.
MUFC players wearing Mucha Fuerza Licha on their training shirts. Which means ‘lots of strength Licha’ pic.twitter.com/GuamMLNTPv
— Andy Mitten (@AndyMitten) February 7, 2025
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Ruben Amorim is asked if this competition is a priority. “The main goal,” he says, “is to win the Premier League.” Has he looked at the table recently?
Ruud also talked about Jeremy Monga, the 15-year-old he has on the bench. “He went up to the Under-18s, did well, went up to the Under-21s and did well there too.” They grow up so fast.
The game is on ITV in Britain and Ruud van Nistelrooy is chatting to the pundits. Asked if it feels odd to be at Old Trafford as the visiting manager, he reveals that he went into the home dressing-room by mistake. When he reached the away one, he didn’t much like it. “It’s tiny! And not comfortable. So they got that right.”
“Is the United job too big for Amorim?” wonders Gerry Scott. “I can understand that it is hard to turn a failing club around and even that things might get worse before they get better. His approach seems to have just torpedoed the team however, with no sense as to when it ever might improve. He just seems unready for the demands of managing at such a big team.” He certainly seems to have been surprised by the pace and relentlessness of the Premier League. But to be fair, he has done all right in the cups – seeing off Arsenal in the third round, winning all four of his games in the Europa League so far, and losing only to Spurs in the Carabao, when he went overboard with the rotation.
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Correction! Jake Evans, whose selection was announced by Ruud van Nistelrooy yesterday, is not on the team sheet after all. So, just the one GCSE student for Leicester – Monga, the 15-year-old left-winger. Still, it’s quite something. At the risk of making you feel old, I am obliged to report that Monga was born in July 2009.
Teams in full: Leicester
Leicester (4-2-3-1) Hermansen; Justin, Faes, Okoli, Thomas; Ndidi, Soumaré; Ayew, El Khanouss, De Cordova-Reid; Daka.
Subs: Stolarczyk, Coulibaly, Coady, Skipp, Winks, Mavididi, Buonanotte, McAteer, Monga.
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Teams in full: United
Man United (3-4-2-1) Onana; Mazraoui, Maguire, Yoro; Dalot, Ugarte, Fernandes, Dorgu; Amad, Mainoo; Højlund.
Subs: Graczyk, Heaven, Lindelof, De Ligt, Collyer, Casemiro, Eriksen, Garnacho, Zirkzee.
Teams in brief: no Vardy!
The bad news for Leicester fans is that the venerable Jamie Vardy – at 38, the same age as Dorgu and Heaven put together – is not on the team sheet. The good news is that Ruud van Nistelrooy has a striker on the bench who is only 16: Jake Evans. And he’s not the youngest player in the squad, either. Also among the subs is Jeremy Monga, a left-winger who is 15. This is not a typo.
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Teams in brief: Dorgu starts for United
United made only one senior-ish signing in the transfer window – the 20-year-old wing-back Patrick Dorgu, from Lecce. Ruben Amorim decides to throw him in at the deep end. Another new recruit, the 18-year-old centre-back Ayden Heaven from Arsenal, is on the bench. The kid is a headline waiting to happen.
Pre-match reading
Michael Butler has been taking a close look at how these two managers have fared since they took over. Even the stattos agree: both teams have got worse.
Preamble
Evening everyone and welcome to live coverage of the fourth round of the FA Cup. First up is the Ruud van Nistelrooy derby, or should that be Harry Maguire and Jonny Evans?
On paper, this is a big game: Man United, the holders of the FA Cup and the winners 12 times before that, entertaining Leicester, who won the cup in 2021. On form, it’s not so hot, as both these clubs have fallen on lean times. Leicester, 18th in the Premier League, may well be heading for relegation, and United, who are 13th, haven’t been much better – at least since Van Nistelrooy left them in November, after being personally ushered towards the exit by Ruben Amorim.
This is the third meeting between the sides at Old Trafford this season, and in the first two Ruud was triumphant. As United’s acting manager, he steered his old team to two decisive wins – 5-2 in the Carabao Cup and 3-0 in the league. How Amorim could do with those scorelines now.
Leicester were so impressed with their back-to-back hidings that they hired Ruud to rescue them from the drop. That hasn’t gone so well… in fact, both clubs have newish bosses who appear to have made them worse. It’s the new-manager slump!
Kick-off is at 8pm and I’ll see you soon with the teams.
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