Manchester United manager Ruben Amorim recently gave an interview, where the Portuguese coach talked about relevant topics and situations.
What I’ve Learned This Season
I really wish I could go back to last year. We endured a lot of pain back then, and looking back now, I would do things in a completely different way. As a manager this year, I’ve learned more than I did in the previous five years. I would change many things in different ways—not just in all aspects, but also on the pitch and in matches. No matter what happens in the future, I’ve learned a lot, and I’m a different manager now.
It’s hard to generalize, but taking away all the value of last year’s squad may not have been the right choice every time. I watched last season’s games to understand different things. I’m a different manager today. I might make about 75% changes, but the key red lines remain the same. I think I’m a better manager now.
We lost points due to certain details. It’s not like last year—last year, I felt we didn’t create chances and struggled along with a thin squad in the Europa League and Premier League. This year, we’re not perfect in details and thus been punished. If you look at our games, we create more chances, dominate matches, and are improving in many aspects, but we concede goals because of details. Everything is interrelated—training quality and focus, then translating that into matches.
Training requires 100% focus—100% attention to speed, energy, body language, all aspects. We need to improve this. When we can do this naturally in every game, the details will show, and we will win more matches. This is where we need to work hard to improve.
Sometimes it seems easy, but it’s not. It’s a team culture, a culture within everyone, and we’re trying to improve this. We’re making progress. The team is training much better, but I think we still have a lot of room for improvement.
How to Judge if a Player Fits the Team
I think my intuition is good. So we won’t sign players who give me that bad vibe in person. They might mislead me a little, but it’s hard. So I trust my feeling, and most of the time, my judgment is correct.
I just look at the person, maybe the way they speak, and I think I can tell who’s talking nonsense. I don’t know exactly how.
Possibility of Signings in the January Transfer Window
We still have room to sign more players, but it’s very important for our club to make plans. We need to sign players we know well. It’s hard to be sure everything will go smoothly, but we need to have confidence in the players we bring in.
If we’re not sure, it’s better not to sign anyone and rely on our existing players. This is clear to me. Maybe I should take a different approach like many other coaches, but this is my idea, and I think the board thinks the same way. We can’t repeat past mistakes; we have to get through this difficult period because we have players from international teams and Europe in our squad.
