TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR STADIUM — A few yards away from where Manchester United’s youthful substitutes were warming up sat two giants of the club’s history in every sense, Jaap Stam and Peter Schmeichel.
What Ruben Amorim would have given to have even one player of such experience and gravitas in his dressing room. If either had brought his boots, Amorim might even have picked him, given the bare bones of the squad on show for United’s 1-0 defeat to Tottenham Hotspur.
The Red Devils bench featured only one recognised first-teamer, Victor Lindelof, as the club’s injury crisis forced Amorim to name eight teenagers alongside him. It could have undermined the Portuguese boss’s recent plea to improve United’s academy, but this crop were picked on the grounds that they were warm bodies in the building, rather than any prodigious talent.
Tottenham ease the pressure on Ange Postecoglou with 1-0 win over Man Utd
Read MoreThere is ability there: Chido Obi-Martin scored a hat-trick for the under-18s this week against the mighty Chelsea and bagged 32 goals in 18 age-group league games last season for Arsenal; Ayden Heaven, also a former Gunner, was worth cash-strapped (see Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s insistence) United spending £1.5m on. But thrown into a game away from home where 15th-place United are in need of a footballing defibrillator is not how anyone would want to blood them.
Far better to offer them the chance to come on at Old Trafford, 3-0 up against a tamed mid-table team just to dip their toe in the Premier League. But United are the tame mid-table team now, beaten 12 times in the league already this season, their most in 50 years. They are the team against whom other managers can happily blood their own youngsters.
And you would want Obi-Martin, for example, to be surrounded by leaders too, when he comes on for his debut, who can ease the nerves of a 17-year-old coming on to try and change a Premier League game for the first time. But Amorim himself described United last month has “starved of leaders”, although he has changed tact since and urged his players not to look at the big picture.
“In this moment it’s like survival, thinking [about] the small things, to improve the small things from this game for the next game,” Amorim said.
“Not thinking, not even look at the table, the schedule, nothing like that.
“Of course, I have to, because we will have a lot of games. We have three competitions with a small squad at the moment. That part is my part.
“But the players, everyone in Carrington, just focus on the next game, the next training, and that is the our goal.”
But even so, where are the Stams and Schmeichels of this team? The men who will drag them through those next games on a minute-to-minute basis?
Certainly not in goal, where Andre Onana inspires no confidence whatsoever. Onana was pinned to his line, seeming to rely on hope rather than positive positioning to deal with crosses from Son Heung-Min and Djed Spence in particular. A better keeper would also have pointed out that Diogo Dalot was giving Son far too much space at the back post, a failing that proved costly for the opening goal.
'Ruthless' Ineos job cuts at Man Utd leave fans fearing for £2bn stadium project
Read MoreAnother obvious leader, Harry Maguire, was cut down to size by Erik ten Hag, stripped of the captaincy over his loss of form. Amorim did trigger a one-year contract extension for the defender last month, but says he still “has to improve” as a leader. He is a former captain of the club and 60-cap international, yet he does not seem to be the one organising the defence.
Casemiro, a five-time Champions League winner, was the most animated after United conceded. He threw his arms up in petulance before turning his back on his defence to stand waiting for Spurs to finish their celebrations.
Captain Bruno Fernandes simply stared at his feet.
The 1-0 defeat to Tottenham was by no means the most egregious dereliction of duty by United’s senior players. It wasn’t even their worst performance against this opposition this season, the 3-0 defeat away from home earlier in the season representing the beginning of the end for Ten Hag ranking higher (or lower?).
Garnacho stung the hands of Guglielmo Vicario on several occasions, although he also skied a gilt-edged chance over the bar in the first half, a goal that would have been his first since November and changed the timbre of the game. Joshua Zirkzee came within in inches of scoring too with a glancing second-half header. Dalot had statistically the best chance of the game, but scuffed it badly across goal, in keeping with the rest of his performance.
Maybe if United had scored any of those chances, maybe those dormant leaders would have been ignited. Maybe.
But leadership is about standing up when those around you will not or cannot, and lifting them when they are down.
Right now, United are a long way down. And no one is prepared to lift them up.
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( Man Utd desperately lack leaders with Fernandes and Maguire both culpable )
Also on site :
- Get an email about a ‘Lopez Voice Assistant Class Action Settlement'? Here's why
- Zelensky challenges Putin’s offer to meet after Russia ignores ceasefire demand
- Keir says ‘we cant live on an island of strangers’ as he overhauls migration & cracks down on deportation dodgers