Ruben Amorim keeps telling us how bad things are at Manchester United – and a new stat has certainly proved his point.
The Red Devils lost 4-3 away at Brentford to ensure their worst-ever Premier League season continues towards its drab conclusion.
So drab, in fact, that they’re now on a six-game winless run – something they haven’t achieved in ten years.
The run, which has seen four defeats, is the worst since United did the same under Louis van Gaal in December 2015.
On that occasion, Van Gaal stopped the slide at the seven-game mark with a win over Swansea, where he would go on to finish the season with an FA Cup title.
Amorim could still have similar success, but will hope for a different outcome as Van Gaal was sacked shortly after his triumph to make way for Jose Mourinho.
The former Sporting coach has one foot in the final of the Europa League, 3-0 up against Athletic Bilbao before the return leg at Old Trafford.
Amorim only joined the club in November and was hired by the current Jim Ratcliffe-led regime, meaning there’s surely little threat over a sacking.
However, Van Gaal was ruthlessly sacked after finishing fifth in the Premier League, whereas the Portuguese is on course for 15th.
A worst-ever season is already confirmed for United, in fact they’ve been so bad they made sure of that three games ago at the start of April.
A 4-1 defeat to Newcastle made it mathematically sure that the Red Devils would finish the season with their lowest-ever points total.
Yet despite finishing so much lower than Van Gaal, Amorim’s title win could prove to be far more valuable.
Victory in the Europa League final against either Tottenham Hotspur or Bodo/Glimt would book a place in next season’s Champions League and the riches that come with it.
So clear is it that Europe is where the club’s focus lies, that even Amorim admitted it before the defeat to Brentford.
“At the moment we have to be clear that our focus is more on saving players and trying to be competitive [in Europe],” he explained.
“It’s not a good thing to say, but we have to understand the context.
“We’re in the final games of the season and some of the players are playing all the time.
“We need to be careful, our focus is on the Europa League, and we have to prepare the present and also the future.”
Asked about the Europa after the Brentford defeat, he added: “It’s massive for us.
“All the suffering that we’ve had in these last games in the Premier League, we must do something about that.
“We can do that on Thursday, we have our fans, and we need them a lot.”
