Ruben Amorim has said Bruno Fernandes will continue as Manchester United’s penalty taker despite missing two of the three awarded the team this season.
Fernandes missed from the spot in the 1-1 draw at Fulham and the 3-1 defeat at Brentford, scoring in the 3-2 win over Burnley. Amorim said: “Yes, he’s the main taker. I think he has 70 penalties and he misses nine – two with me.”
The head coach chuckled as he reflected on the two missed under him. “I’m really annoyed with that,” Amorim said. “But he’s really confident. He’s training [to take] the penalties, trying to understand that people are watching the way he [tries to] score penalties. So he will be ready.”
United are at Liverpool on Sunday, having won there in the Premier League once in the past decade: a 1-0 win in 2016 via a Wayne Rooney goal. Amorim was asked whether his players were ready for a bear-pit-like atmosphere at Anfield and looked back to January’s 2-2 draw there.
“The environment is going to be loud but we are ready to play in that,” he said. “If you look at last year, sometimes we play better in that kind of environment than the pressure at home. We never know what is going to happen. We showed last year there, we can handle it. The way we start the game is more important than the environment. To do a really good warm-up. To have a feeling. To understand that it’s going to be tough in the first moments. I know they are ready.”
Amorim dismissed United’s poor recent record at Anfield by saying many in his side may not be aware of it. “Football players nowadays don’t watch many games, unfortunately,” he said. “I have so many things to use [as inspiration] with our players. Like winning back-to-back games [in the league for the first time]. We have so much to win if we perform and win the next game. I don’t need to use those games in the past.”
Amorim was asked about reports linking Kobbie Mainoo and Joshua Zirkzee with possible moves in January. He said: “I know that in our club there is a lot of noise. You have to have news. Players are not playing. They want to play. There’s a World Cup. I understand that but they are our players and we need everyone to have a good season.”
A claim by Marcus Rashford, who is on loan at Barcelona, that he had been in an “inconsistent environment” at United was shrugged off by Amorim. “I’m just focused on the future of the club, on the present of the club,” he said. “That is the most important thing.”
