{"id":191227,"date":"2025-10-10T20:07:15","date_gmt":"2025-10-10T20:07:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/191227\/"},"modified":"2025-10-10T20:07:15","modified_gmt":"2025-10-10T20:07:15","slug":"michael-owen-takes-aim-at-man-united-legends-pundit-claims-criticism-of-ruben-amorims-divisive-system-is-embarrassing-after-gary-neville-and-wayne-rooney-urged-stubborn-manager-to-ditch-formation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/191227\/","title":{"rendered":"Michael Owen takes aim at Man United legends: Pundit claims criticism of Ruben Amorim’s divisive system is ‘EMBARRASSING’ after Gary Neville and Wayne Rooney urged stubborn manager to ditch formation"},"content":{"rendered":"

Michael Owen<\/a> says it\u2019s \u2018embarrassing\u2019 to blame Ruben Amorim<\/a>\u2019s back-three system for the problems at Manchester United<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Owen agrees with the United boss that pundits criticising Amorim\u2019s 3-4-2-1 formation might have got into his players\u2019 heads and made them question it.<\/p>\n

Several former Red Devils stars, including Gary Neville<\/a> and Wayne Rooney<\/a>, have been critical of Amorim’s stubbornness not to ditch the system, which has seen United win less than half of their Premier League<\/a> games this season and crash out of the Carabao Cup<\/a> to Grimsby Town in the second round on penalties.<\/p>\n

But former United striker Owen insists the club\u2019s problems run much deeper than the tactical changes made by the Portuguese head coach who is under pressure as he approaches his first anniversary in charge.<\/p>\n

\u2018They have changed the manager numerous times since Fergie left,\u2019 said Owen. \u2018Then they blamed the players; spent billions on players and got some of the best players in the world, only for the club to be seen as a bit of a graveyard for players in the last decade.<\/p>\n

\u2018Next it was the people buying the players, so everyone wanted rid of them. Then it was the board, so the board was shuffled around when Sir Jim Ratcliffe<\/a> got involved.<\/p>\n

\"Michael <\/p>\n

Michael Owen has come out in defence of struggling Ruben Amorim\u2019s back-three system<\/p>\n

\"Amorim <\/p>\n

Amorim has refused to compromise on his philosophy despite United’s faltering from so far<\/p>\n

\"Wayne \"Gary <\/p>\n

Man United legends Wayne Rooney (left) and Gary Neville (right) criticised the 3-4-2-1 system<\/p>\n

\u2018Then it’s the fault of the facilities so they wanted to revamp the training ground and put plans in for a new stadium.<\/p>\n

\u2018Then it’s the staff, so half the backroom staff, physios, doctors, canteen lady, the whole thing, wiped clean and a new start there.<\/p>\n

\u2018The latest one is it\u2019s because they’re playing a back-three. If I’m not wrong, I watched Erik Ten Hag about a year ago playing a back-four, and it was some of the most awful football I’ve ever seen from a Manchester United team.<\/p>\n

\u2018Some great teams over the years have played with a back-three. I’m not saying that’s my favourite formation at all, and I’m not saying that Amorim is right to be steadfast in his beliefs in that formation.<\/p>\n

\u2018But I certainly don’t think all of United’s problems now are because they play with the back-three.<\/p>\n

\u2018It’s embarrassing if you’re going to say the main reason for the downturn is because they play a back-three. I mean, it really isn’t. They could go back to a back-four and play as bad as they did under Ten Hag, then the screams would be equally as loud.\u2019<\/p>\n

Speaking to casino.co.uk<\/a>, Owen said he understands Amorim\u2019s concern that negative comments from pundits about his philosophy might be influencing the United squad.<\/p>\n

\u2018I could totally buy that,\u2019 he added. \u2018Players aren’t sheltered away from everything. They’re driving cars to training, putting the radio on. They sit at home in the lounge with the TV on. They read social media. They can do all these things. If you’re interested in football, you can’t get away from what people are thinking and saying about it.<\/p>\n

\"United <\/p>\n

United have won less than half their games in the Premier League and are already out of the Carabao Cup, having crashed out in the second round against Grimsby Town on penalties<\/p>\n

\"Former <\/p>\n

Former Manchester United striker Owen, pictured with Prime Minister Keir Starmer, believes it\u2019s only a matter of time before the sleeping Premier League giants are successful again<\/p>\n

\u2018Whether footballers should be swayed by those comments or impacted by them, that’s a different argument. But I’ve got no doubt that people will watch and will listen to people they probably respected and thought were great players growing up. They\u2019ll listen to those opinions.<\/p>\n

\u2018If they’re saying certain things, then it might enter their head, and they could perhaps wonder if the manager is doing the right thing. They might have their own ideas, but that’s not a new phenomenon.<\/p>\n

\u2018That will never change. It never has changed, but I do think it is a relevant point to make by Amorim.\u2019<\/p>\n

Owen believes it\u2019s only a matter of time before United are successful again, but warned that Amorim has to give fans a reason to hope that he can be the man to bring back the glory days.<\/p>\n

\u2018The United fans will be patient if they can see something,\u2019 he said. \u2018I don’t think anybody expects them to go from what they’ve been over the last 10 years to suddenly winning the league.<\/p>\n

\u2018The supporters\u2019 just want to see a bit of a plan, even if they get beaten. They want to see some progress, something to hang their hat on.<\/p>\n

\u2018I think that’s the bit that Manchester United fans are struggling with now \u2013 renewed hope with a new manager. Amorim hasn’t produced results and hasn’t given them anything to think that things could be hugely better in the future, and that’s the problem.<\/p>\n

\u2018Pundits and fans do just go around in circles. When you look at what’s been wrong with Manchester United over the years, it was the manager who was blamed.<\/p>\n

\"Owen <\/p>\n

Owen pictured next to Paul Scholes (left) and Ryan Giggs (right) after winning the league title<\/p>\n

\u2018These projects do happen with the big teams. It happened at Liverpool in the 90s, It happened slightly to Arsenal after Wenger left, trying to find the right manager, the right players, the right fix.<\/p>\n

\u2018It\u2019s taken a while at Manchester United, and although there’s no sign of them doing it now, it will click eventually. It might be two years, might be four, it might be six, it might even be 10 years, but everyone knows that Manchester United will win the Premier League again.<\/p>\n

\u2018They’re too big, too rich and too good of a club to not do that. It’s just a question of when they can get it all right.\u2019<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Michael Owen says it\u2019s \u2018embarrassing\u2019 to blame Ruben Amorim\u2019s back-three system for the problems at Manchester United. Owen…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":191228,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[97,218,33718,33158,349,32977,451,217,101,56,54,55,28552],"class_list":["post-191227","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-dailymail","tag-football","tag-gary-neville","tag-jim-ratcliffe","tag-manchester-united","tag-michael-owen","tag-ruben-amorim","tag-sport","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom","tag-wayne-rooney"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191227","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=191227"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191227\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/191228"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=191227"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=191227"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=191227"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}