Man Utd 0 Bournemouth 3: Ruben Amorim suffers worst day since joining as Premier League season doomed before Christmas
BAH HUMBUG. For all his multi–lingual talents that is a phrase that would probably have been lost in translation for Ruben Amorim.
Or at least until now.
For Manchester United will be in the bottom half of the table in the festive season for the first time in the Premier League era.
It’s going to be cold this Christmas, and not just for Marcus Rashford who now knows for sure that there is no room for him at the inn.
Indeed not since 1989 and the former self of England’s top flight have they been lower than seventh on New Year’s Day.
But after goals from Dean Huijsen, Justin Kluivert and Antoine Semenyo left them tattered in bits, they might suffer that same ignominy even if they do win their next two games against Wolves and Newcastle United.
After this humiliation, United fans shouldn’t be holding their breath on them getting anything from those clashes at all.
Bah humbug indeed.
Amorim’s team, in the main, were awful while Andoni Iraola’s upwardly-mobile side are now above champions Manchester City in fifth.
Quicker feet, quicker passes and above all quicker brains. That’s what his side displayed right from the start.
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The Spaniard’s opponents? Not much of any of those characteristics.
Time after time in the first half, United’s players were caught in possession – Bruno Fernandes, Kobbie Mainoo, Manuel Ugarte, Lisandro Martinez, just a few of those taken prisoner.
Amorim continues to repeat that his re-education of the great pretenders he picked up from Erik ten Hag would take time.
Seven days earlier there had been that late Amad–inspired Manchester derby victory that might have been expected to enhance confidence and morale.
Even the ultimately-vain Carabao Cup fightback from three behind to Tottenham in midweek was spun as some proof that a new fire is burning within the Red Devils.
But even allowing for the fact that Bournemouth are slick, high-energy and organised, Amorim will have been stunned at the utter lack of cohesion – and even feistiness – within his side.
Maybe players are over-thinking, or maybe they just don’t have the capacity and football intelligence to change.
Either way, it was therefore no surprise whatsoever that the visitors went ahead in the 30th minute.
And no shock, at all, that Huijsen profited from a set-piece, Ryan Christie firing over a free-kick from United’s right.
The centre-back rose almost unchallenged at the front of a pack of players to head backwards over Andre Onana’s flailing attempt to save.
That’s the fourth time in Amorim’s nine games they have conceded from a set-piece – twice against Arsenal and on Nottingham Forest’s recent visit.
What’s more, the Dutchman’s effort meant a sixth time since the Portuguese arrived to start his assessment of the Old Trafford shambles that his side had gone behind.
They weren’t helped early in this clash by Onana, who looked jumpy and uncertain, twice almost dropped team-mates in the brown stuff with poor attempts to play out from the back.
Meanwhile, Joshua Zirkzee had been given the nod ahead of the improving Rasmus Hojlund, who had collected five goals since Amorim’s arrival.
What the new manager sees in him few outside Old Trafford can work out for he doesn’t have the body strength to play against big, tough defenders like Huijsen and Illia Zabarnyi.
Nor the knowhow to find space away from his markers – and so until Hoijlund replaced him in the 55th minute, balls powered up to him just kept bouncing back.
Skipper Fernandes should have equalised four minutes from the break but for all the fact that his performances have been perking up he, too, found himself caught up in the death wish that gripped the team he leads.
Amad cut a perfect pass back to him but the playmaker dragged horribly wide.
He looked disgusted with himself and well he might although sixty seconds later he did bring out a decent parry from Kepa.
Yet if the faithful were hoping for a repeat of the Etihad comeback they were sadly mistaken.
Amorim replaced Tyrell Malacia with £59million Lenny Yoro at the start of the second half and, along with Hoijlund, sent on Alejandro Garnacho for Ugarte.
But things only got worse for United – and turned into the same sort of embarrassment Bournemouth inflicted with their 3-0 win this time last year.
The Cherries smelled blood, went for the throat and savaged Amorim’s stumbling, clueless crew.
Noussair Mazraoui had no chance of surviving VAR’s review of referee Craig Pawson’s decision to point to the spot following his brain-dead challenge on the scampering Kluivert.
And the Dutchman then gave Onana no chance with his 61st-minute penalty.
Mainoo, far, far from his breakthrough best of last season, was again ambushed in possession, Semenyo leaving him in his wake before triggering a quick, devastating move.
The Ghanian attacker then sprinted forward, unmarked, to get on the end of Dango Ouattara’s low cross and never looked like at the end of two nightmare minutes for a team that looked as lost again as in the dark, final days of Ten Hag’s tenure.