Manchester United boss Ruben Amorim has insisted that he has no regrets about his lineup and the substitutions he made, despite these calls not working as his side suffered a crushing 4-1 defeat to Newcastle.
Sandro Tonali scored Newcastle’s opener in the first half after a fine Alexander Isak pass but Alejandro Garnacho restored parity heading into the break.
United collapsed in the second half, with Harvey Barnes scoring twice before Bruno Guimaraes rounded off the rout after an error from Altay Bayindir.
Amorim shuffled his lineup from the side that drew 2-2 with Lyon, but the tactical approach failed to yield results. Bayindir replaced Andre Onana, who had a tough outing at the Groupama Stadium, but the Turkey international too was at fault, committing a costly error that led to a goal for the opposition.
Victor Lindelf stepped in for Harry Maguire but struggled to make an impact, playing a part in the Magpies opener after failing to close down Isak effectively.
Christian Eriksen offered very little to nothing in the middle of the park and didn’t gel well with Manuel Ugarte. After Joshua Zirkee came off with an injury, Amorim brought on Rasmus Hojlund in his place as well as Mason Mount and Patrick Dorgu for Garnacho and Harry Amass respectively. Mount and Dorgu did not make any difference whatsoever.
Amorim later introduced Kobbie Mainoo and Luke Shaw but by that time, the game was already lost and there was no hope of mounting a comeback.
Asked in his post-match presser whether he regretted his lineup and some of the decisions he made, Amorim answered [as quoted by Manchester Evening News], “No, nothing.”
“Because we did mistakes and they were better. Even if we put a different XI we dont know the result.”
“But we had to make choices, we played three days ago. You can see with Josh, he was fresh but he had a problem, so sometimes we need to make choices and we dont know the result even with a different XI.”
“I was waiting for 60 minutes, more or less, but then with one stop I was getting a little bit, not afraid, but to try to avoid more problems.”
The United head coach continued, “It is really difficult to look at the best things. The best thing is to focus on the next one. Analyse this one, but it is really hard to be here after this result and try to see. Maybe in a few days I will watch the game and try to take that but in this moment it is really hard to have any feeling of a good feeling about the game.”
Amorim slammed his players for failing to react after Newcastle re-took the lead in the second half.
“Yeah, when we suffer the second goal in the beginning of the second half we went down and we need to be better in these moments. We need to control it.”
“They are already a really, really good team but the mistakes we made during the game helped the team to win confidence and win the game.”
“We need to accept that (the lowest points tally) and to move forward and try to do things so much better in the future so we dont have this kind of season. And then you can see some goals: they were doing high pressure and we lose the possession in some moments and some spaces that we cannot lose the possession.”
“So we need to improve in a lot of things and our position is a reflection of our performances this season.”
Amorim refused to confirm if he will recall Onana for Thursday’s return leg against Lyon.
“Im going to continue to do the same. We are going to analyse the game, but we need to focus on the next one, we cannot change this one, the next one is massive for us, so lets focus on the next one on Thursday to play better and to win the game.”
“You guys have to wait (to see if Onana will start). We are going to start the next week tomorrow and Im going to choose the best starting XI for the next one.”
United are now in 14th place in the Premier League with six games left to play.
Featured image George Wood via Getty Images
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Derick Kinoti Derick Kinoti is a football writer at The Peoples Person who has covered Manchester United and the game extensively for many years. He is a keen analyst with expertise in SEO and journalism standards. Derick is convinced Wayne Rooney is the true GOAT and won’t hear otherwise!
