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Manchester United fell to a disappointing 3-2 defeat at home to Nottingham Forest tonight, as reality hit Ruben Amorim hard.
The loss was his first at Old Trafford as United boss, and his second in a row after United’s trip to Arsenal ended 2-0 to the hosts.
Nikola Milenkovic put Forest ahead within two minutes, but Rasmus Hojlund evened the score with an excellent poacher’s goal.
After the restart, United descended into farce and shipped two dismal goals before Bruno Fernandes smashed one home to bring the Red Devils back into the game.
While it largely halted Forest’s dominance, it wasn’t enough to inspire a full comeback and the game ended with a whimper, United huffing and puffing but displaying nowhere near the quality needed to secure a point.
Here are four things we learned from the match.
The circus is back in town
Manchester United fans are all too used to witnessing pantomimes instead of blockbusters at the Theatre of Dreams, and parts of tonight’s defeat to Nottingham Forest fit neatly into the former category.
The opening minutes of the second half felt like a fever dream, as Onana seemed to dodge out of the way of Morgan Gibbs-White’s long-range effort to put the visitors back in front as the Cameroonian regressed into last season’s torrid form.
But things got worse – and weirder – when Chris Wood’s looping header was politely watched over the line by the goalkeeper and Martinez in a disastrous communication breakdown.
Appropriately enough, Onana was at the centre of attention in the dying moments of what rapidly became a fiasco for United when he wasted desperately-needed seconds trying to steal an extra yard with a free-kick; after being repeatedly sent back by the referee, the long punt upfield went nowhere.
There have of course been mistakes and bad luck in the last few weeks, but this was Ruben Amorim’s first taste of just how bizarre things can get at Old Trafford, and was a crushing return to reality for the Red Army.
Backed into a corner
United were behind after 91 seconds and the goal came, with a grim predictability, from a corner. Following the 2-0 defeat at Arsenal on Wednesday night it was three consecutive goals conceded directly from corners, and the team’s confidence in this department looks shot.
For Forest’s opener, a defensive mismatch left Lisandro Martinez to be monstered from a standing start by the towering Nikola Milenkovic rushing at full tilt. The Argentinian could have done better, but Diogo Dalot’s ball-watching left a player doubtless identified as a weakness terribly exposed.
With the score at 1-1 the United bar was left quivering by another powerful Milenkovic header from a well-worked free-kick, and Forest came close to scoring from another corner when tentative defending left Murillo to lash a loose ball wide.
Amorim will be desperate to get his players back to the training ground to fix the set piece issue before it becomes a cheat code for opponents to exploit. But if Bruno Fernandes is taking the corners for United’s defensive drills there is little chance of improvement, as the captain repeatedly failed to beat the first man tonight. There is lots of work for the club’s set piece coach to do.
How the tables have turned
The Amorim era may still be in its infancy, but the Portuguese’s version of the Red Devils already has its trademark – explosive starts to halves of football. But this dynamic was turned on its head by Forest, who struck within two minutes of kick off at the start of both halves to force United immediately onto the back foot.
Granted, the first was a set-piece and the second a baffling error from Onana, but it set a decidedly different tone to normal. United were unruffled in the first half, when Rasmus Hojlund’s equaliser was more a case of ‘when’ than ‘if’. But when Forest exploded out of the traps after the restart United were a rabbit trapped in the headlights, unable to get going again and lucky to concede only once more before the ship was steadied.
After doing a fair job of bucking them up so far, Amorim can’t afford to let his stars slide back into the weak mentality that caused such consistent mediocrity under his predecessors.
What now?
Amorim has repeatedly said that he is under no illusions in the United dugout, and is frank in acknowledging that there is lots of work to do. The midweek defeat at Arsenal was disappointing, but there were some positives to take and the Gunners are somewhere in the mix for the title race.
But a home defeat of this nature to Nottingham Forest – high-flying under Nuno Espirito Santo but still a side United should be beating – gives him the clearest taste yet of the scale of the problem. United’s next Premier League match is away at Manchester City, and an accomplished performance tonight could have given the club real optimism going into it, especially given City’s current form.
However, any positivity will now have to come from the midweek Europa League game against Viktoria Plzen. The gap between United and City, regardless of Pep Guardiola’s current headaches, feels just as colossal as ever.
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