Ruben Amorim sacked live updates: Manchester United next manager latest as Fletcher takes interim charge
SOURCE:The Athletic|BY:Ed Mackey
Ruben Amorim was relieved of his position as Manchester United manager after 14 months in charge
Ruben Amorim was relieved of his position as Manchester United manager after 14 months in charge
Ed Mackey
January 5, 2026 at 4:48 PM EST
Ruben Amorim joined Manchester United in November 2024. Getty Images
Ruben Amorim sacked by Manchester United — latest
Ruben Amorim has been sacked by Manchester United, ending his 14-month tenure at Old Trafford.
The Portuguese coach joined the club in November 2024 from Sporting CP and leaves the club following Sunday's 1-1 draw away to Leeds United.
Amorim hinted at a fractured relationship with those working above him at Old Trafford following yesterday's result, claiming to be the “manager” of United, not the “coach”.
He leaves the 13-time Premier League champions sixth in the table having won just three of their last 11 matches.
Former United midfielder and current Under-18 head coach Darren Fletcher will take charge of Wednesday night's visit to face Burnley in the Premier League.
Share your thoughts: live@theathletic.com
A good omen for the interim?
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Interim boss Darren Fletcher has a close relationship with his former manager, Sir Alex Ferguson.
No United manager since Ferguson left has ever been able to come close to reaching the levels he got from many a team in his time at the club.
Fletcher is so close to Ferguson that he can call him whenever he wants.
What type of manager will Fletcher be?
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According to our man Andy Mitten, a good one. He spoke to one source, who worked under every manager since Sir Alex Ferguson, is no longer at United and is not sanctioned to speak publicly by his new employers, about Fletcher. Here’s what they said:
💬 “I have genuine faith as him as a manager. He has been incredibly supportive of every manager and coach. He’s extremely skilled and professional, energetic, enthusiastic and giving. He has always been studious and wanted to become better.
“I realise I might sound like his spin doctor here, but I mean every word. Darren had an excellent balance between the human side and the coaching side with very good relationships with everyone inside the club — football and non-football.”
Set your alarms for Fletcher's first press conference
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As part of his responsibilities for Wednesday's Premier League trip to face Burnley on Wednesday, Darren Fletcher will take tomorrow's pre-match press conference.
It takes place at 5pm GMT (12pm ET) and there will be coverage of the best bits here on The Athletic.
No Manchester United media conference is ever quiet, but that will be particularly busy.
I imagine the United press officer will be preparing the interim manager for questions on Ruben Amorim, his own long-term aspirations and whether he knows what the managerial plan is at Old Trafford.
Reader emails: Mixed opinions on Amorim sacking
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We are getting of plenty of emails to our inbox — thanks to everyone who has sent us in their thoughts.
Jigar Shah: I get why so many fans are frustrated/irritated/angry/disillusioned with this sacking but I think this was bound to happen if not now then in the summer. Maybe reason for his firing was more about egos and questioning authority than football but, I do think its the right decision and assuming we are back to square one is wrong.
Paul Peppiate: Sacking Amorim at this point is wrong, wrong, wrong. And somehow, even more wrong.
If Sir Jim Ratcliffe is saying Amorim gets three years, everyone accepts it’ll take at least two transfer windows for him to properly shape the squad, and the club is supposedly done with quick fixes - how on earth does any of this add up?
The whole rollercoaster starts again. Ridiculous.
Barry Fitzgerald: While I was sometimes mystified by Amorim's decisions, especially his decision to substitute defenders at the end of games — which was a bugbear of mine — I thought that United were making some progress.
If you want to give us your thoughts on Amorim's sacking, then email us at live@theathletic.com.
Might it all have been different if Amorim went to back four?
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In recent weeks, partly because of players lost to the Africa Cup of Nations, Amorim has ventured away from 3-4-3, in various forms. Sometimes, 3-4-3 has been the base system but the players have shifted into different structures. Sometimes it’s clearly been a back four. Sometimes it’s been difficult to work out the system at all.
Of course, it can seem hypocritical for everyone to spend a year saying Amorim needs to change the system and then admonish him for doing so. But he made 3-4-3 his ideology, his everything.
What if Amorim had realised the 3-4-3 didn’t work earlier, at some point before the Europa League final defeat to an equally shambolic Tottenham Hotspur side? United might be in the Champions League this season, and things might be very different.
Amorim's selection decisions left a lot to be desired
Beyond the basic formation problems, Amorim has made some baffling selection decisions. Last December, at home to a Newcastle United side renowned for their midfield power, Amorim used his slowest central-midfield duo, Casemiro and Christian Eriksen. Amorim’s side were completely overrun, and lucky to only lose 2-0.
This season, he hasn’t looked capable of making decisive in-game changes: he was incredibly slow to use his bench when United were playing against an Everton side who had been down to 10 men from the 13th minute after Idrissa Gueye lashed out at his own team-mate Michael Keane. It was unforgivable for United to lose that game at all, let alone so meekly.
Even in the 1-0 win over Newcastle United on Boxing Day, Amorim’s changes were odd, as if he was trying to finish the game with the most youthful side imaginable, rather than trying to formulate something suited to Newcastle’s constant pressure. They held out for the victory, but again it was difficult to attribute that to the manager’s approach.
Amorim's devotion to 3-4-3 was destined to end in tears
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When United actually played Amorim’s default style of football, things never looked right. It is rare for any manager to be as overwhelmingly wedded to a system as Amorim was to 3-4-3, and the problems were obvious before he even took charge. This simply wasn’t a group of players with much experience of, or much suitability to, playing 3-4-3. It didn’t work on paper, and often looked worse on the pitch.
Amorim repeatedly experimented with players in two different positions within that system, which underlined the point that they surely belonged somewhere in between. Bruno Fernandes isn’t an inside forward or a deep midfielder, he’s more naturally a No 8 or a No 10. Noussair Mazraoui isn’t a wide centre-back or a wing-back, he’s more naturally a full-back. Amad was used at right wing-back and inside-left this season, but he’s surely a right winger. Kobbie Mainoo was used as a deep midfielder, an attacking midfielder and, at one point, as a centre-forward. The only player who looked more suited to a back three than a back four was Lisandro Martinez, who missed much of Amorim’s reign through injury.
Versatility is important, but this was square pegs in round holes. It’s been boring to repeat this throughout Amorim’s 14 months in charge, but what option is there when it’s been so incredibly obvious? United have not merely looked disjointed, they’ve also been very predictable.
'Amorim's honesty made him vulnerable'
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Amorim is relatable because his honesty made him vulnerable, and it’s impossible not to warm to someone happy to expose themselves like that. It’s undoubtedly a bad idea to be so open, from a self-preservation point of view, and he might have been well advised to dial down the honesty now and then for his own good.
But from a selfish and neutral point of view, it’s a shame to see Amorim leave the Premier League. His (possibly misguided) honesty will be greatly missed, as will his charm and vulnerability. Manchester United fans who have endured the actual football will be forgiven for disagreeing, but it’s been an interesting human study for the rest of us.
For him, though, relief. It’s all over. He doesn’t have to be so honest about how bad Manchester United are anymore.
Reader emails: 'Managers need time to rebuild'
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On the topic of thoughts from our readers, we've had a couple of readers email into our inbox — live@theathletic.com — so let's take a look at them.
E.J.: Managers need time to rebuild a struggling team. And very often when good players are transferred to big teams, they fail to deliver, and that creates more problems for impatient owners.
As far as Manchester United, they need a retired home grown player ready to coach or “manage” the team, and owners to be patient.
V D'Souza: The decision to sack Ruben Amorim is a baffling repeat of the same mistakes that have plagued Manchester United for a decade. It is impossible for any manager to succeed when they are denied the specific player profiles required for their system, only to be blamed for the resulting lack of progress.
However, the most damning aspect of this dismissal is the clear lack of support from the hierarchy. If Amorim is to be sacked, then Wilcox and Vivell must also be held responsible for their roles in this breakdown.
Thanks for getting in touch!
Your thoughts: 'Bizarre timing'
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More of our disgruntled Manchester United-supporting subscribers have been sharing their opinions in our discussion board — you can get involved here.
Christopher M: Not sad to see him go. But the turmoil and change is endless. Not a great feeling.
Tamas B: Should have given time, at least till the end of the season. Now a new manager will come in, with his own tactics, and we spent all this money for nothing. He will want to sign his own players. Utter disaster.
Scott E: Bizarre timing. There have been so many opportunities to sack him that would have seemed reasonable but this still feels weirdly sudden and rash. This club.
Maguire reacts to Amorim sacking
Instagram/harrymaguire93
Harry Maguire was so often the man at the forefront of Ruben Amorim's greatest nights as Manchester United managers.
He scored the winning goals against Lyon and at Anfield against Liverpool, while also scoring a late equaliser to almost bail his team-mates out against Grimsby in the League Cup.
The former United captain has written on his Instagram story:
💬 “Thank you for everything boss. I wish you all the best in the future.”
Amorim stuck true to his word of 'being himself'
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In some ways, it’s fitting that it has all come to an end after another moment of unfiltered honesty. Not from stubbornly sticking with a formation unsuited to his squad, then changing it for some nebulous reason after a year, or winning less than a third of his league games, or finishing 15th in the Premier League, or alienating beloved homegrown players… but from something he said, that was seemingly representative of a broader degradation in relations with those above him.
With almost anyone else in his position, you would think that saying “I’m the manager, not the coach”, despite him literally being the coach, was a classic attempt to get himself sacked, protecting the payoff rather than stepping down himself. But with Amorim, you’re inclined to think that there wasn’t any Machiavellian scheming going on here; he was just honestly expressing what he was feeling again. “I’m tired of saying that I’m not going to behave like this or that,” he said in August. “I’m going to be myself.”
Amorim never shied away from the press
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As Ruben Amorim was effectively working his notice at Sporting CP, there was a look in his eyes that said, “I’ve got the best job in Portugal, I live in beautiful Lisbon, I’m winning titles left, right and centre… and I’m giving it up for this? What have I done?”
In the intervening 14 months, that look never really left his eyes.
But the thing with Amorim is that you didn’t really need to look into those eyes to interpret his emotions or guess what he was thinking, because he was more than happy to tell you himself.
Football managers, particularly those at the top who have to deal with an avalanche of questions from the media every week, are usually very good at deflecting, at giving non-committal answers, at dismissing the premise of a question, at talking for a long time without really saying anything, just to keep the noise to a minimum. In short, it can be very difficult to get them to say anything interesting, at all, ever.
Not Amorim. He is among the easiest managers to get a quote out of that the Premier League has ever seen.
Amorim: The man for the press conference
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It was at their press conferences where Nuno and Thomas Frank expressed their opinions on Ruben Amorim's departure and it was in those media conferences where the Portuguese coach often won most of his admirers.
Some of his predecessors, namely Jose Mourinho and Erik ten Hag, didn't do themselves much good in front of the press and actually probably only added to the pressure on their shoulders when the going got tough.
Amorim, meanwhile, did the opposite, His honest, articulate answers when facing the media earned him admiration and almost certainly gave him more grace as far as Manchester United supporters were concerned.
Had he been more like Mourinho or Ten Hag in front of the press, I'm not sure he would have lasted 14 months in charge.
Breaking: Another high-profile manager sacking
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Ruben Amorim isn't the only head coach of a big club to have lost his job today.
Celtic have relieved Wilfried Nancy of his duties after he lost six of his eight matches in charge across just 33 days.
Nancy was appointed on a two-and-a-half-year deal by the Scottish champions on December 3, joining from MLS side Columbus Crew and replacing the outgoing Brendan Rodgers.
The 48-year-old Frenchman oversaw league defeats at home to Hearts and away to Dundee United, alongside a three-goal home loss to Roma in the Europa League and a 3-1 defeat by St Mirren in the Scottish League Cup final.
After two wins, against Aberdeen and Livingston, Celtic lost 2-0 to Motherwell on Tuesday before losing his first Old Firm on Saturday. The 3-1 home defeat against Rangers turned out to be his final match in charge.
Frank: 'The best clubs are aligned over time'
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Thomas Frank, who has been linked previously with the Manchester United job, was the next Premier League manager to be asked about the Amorim situation at Manchester United.
He gave his opinion on the management structures at clubs in modern-day football.
💬 “It's just another example, from my point of view, that it's very difficult to achieve sustained success if you change key personnel like the head coach, sporting directors. If you think you have the right ones and you are aligned, you need to do it over a long time.
“In this fantastic, beautiful world, you win one day and you're in heaven; you lose and you're in hell. The best clubs are aligned over time and they keep the noise out.”
Nuno sad to see Amorim sacked
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With a full complement of Premier League fixtures this week, Ruben Amorim's peers have been asked his departure from Manchester United.
Countryman Nuno Espirito Santo, preparing for West Ham's huge game against Nottingham Forest tomorrow, was the first to offer his response.
💬 “Like everybody, (I'm) surprised. I'm sad — he's Portuguese, a young manager. But it is what is is. We are aware how the industry works.”
Nuno was then asked what advice he would give to Amorim.
“Go back home, reset and get ready for the next challenge. This is life.”
Your thoughts: 'New owners, same old problems'
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We have had an email to our inbox — get in touch by emailing live@theathletic.com — from Michael Hope who believes the structure of the club is not setting managers up for success.
💬 New owners, same old problems.
Amorim was haunted by the same issues players and coaches have had since Fergie left. Once again we are having to ask, is the manager at fault or the system around him? Surely after 20 years of drift and stagnation, it's the system.
Thanks for the email, Michael. We're still keen to hear from you guys throughout the course of this afternoon, so get in touch and we'll include some of your messages in our live coverage.
United have spent heavily, but they're still falling behind
One reason for the continued expectation on the shoulders of Amorim was United’s hefty transfer spend. For all the cost-cutting elsewhere, funding for new players has been in spritely supply under Sir Jim Ratcliffe: over £500million has been spent on new players in less than two years of his involvement.
The squad Amorim leaves behind has cost £1.2billion to assemble, with £243m spent as recently as last summer. It is a huge sum and one which, unsurprisingly, comes with a minimum expectation in terms of both results and entertainment.
Yet while United have hardly skimped on transfers, peers are overtaking them when it comes to wages — the financial metric most likely to correlate with on-field performance.
United’s wage bill in 2024-25 was £313million, a five-year low. That was £95m less than Manchester City, despite United still employing over 50 per cent more administrative staff than their neighbours. The implication is that the gap between City and United’s playing wage bills is larger still.
All of which is to say that while Amorim was not achieving the results or performances many expect of a Manchester United head coach, the realities of the club’s wage bill are that, actually, sitting sixth, as they do today, isn’t far off where the numbers suggest they should be.
