Manchester United have sacked Ruben Amorim, with the club to face Arsenal at the Emirates Stadium later this month.
David Ornstein reported for The Athletic on Monday morning that Ruben Amorim had been sacked by Manchester United, with Darren Fletcher to take charge on an interim basis. United have since confirmed the decision officially.
Ornstein added that a permanent appointment is likely to wait until the summer, so it sounds as though Fletcher may well be in charge of the side for the remainder of the season.
United’s leadership team reached the decision to sack Amorim after a breakdown in relations behind the scenes, with the club forced to pay the manager’s contract in full. The deal ran to 2027 with the option of a further year.
Arsenal will be watching developments closely, with United set to travel to the Emirates Stadium for a game on January 25th.
The Gunners are already due to face a big-six club with a new manager when they play Chelsea on January 14th, with Enzo Maresca another head coach to leave his position in recent days.
With United not in Europe or the League Cup, they only have three games coming up before the Arsenal match, with two Premier League clashes against Burnley and Manchester City and one FA Cup match against Brighton.
Even so, that should be enough of a sample to get a pretty good idea of how United plan to set up when they visit north London, by which time all of United’s players at AFCON will have returned.
As it stands, Bryan Mbeumo and Noussair Mazraoui are in the quarter-finals with Cameroon and Morocco, and Amad Diallo is in the round-of-16 with the Ivory Coast.
But one of Mbeumo and Mazraoui will be returning this weekend, as Cameroon face Morocco next.