Ruben Amorim has been taking Man Utd training and he has a big red coat and ‘his very own whistle’. But the big olds is that Antony is for sale.
Exclusively yours…
The second week of the international break can seriously reduce grown men to tears, and other supposedly grown men to cast about for a back-page story that they can trumpet as an ‘exclusive’.
So here’s Jeremy Cross, a Goliath bestriding the back pages of both the Daily Star and the Daily Mirror.
And he writes – exclusively remember – in the Daily Mirror: ‘MANCHESTER UNITED will offload flop Antony in the January transfer window.’
Well they can’t unless anybody wants to buy him, Jeremy. And we’re telling you now that no f***er wants to buy him.
The best Manchester United can possibly hope is that a club in Turkey or Greece or Saudi Arabia wants to take him on loan while United continue to pay roughly 87% of his wages.
But of more interest to Mediawatch is the idea that this is an ‘exclusive’; after all, this is from October 29 on the talkSPORT website:
Manchester United will cut their losses on £86million flop Antony following Erik ten Hag’s sacking.
talkSPORT understands Antony has already been told he can leave Old Trafford when the transfer window reopens in January after failing to justify becoming the second-most expensive player in United’s history.
Three weeks later it’s a Mirror and Star back-page exclusive as the international break bites. But maybe the ‘exclusive’ part of the story comes next…
And United boss Ruben Amorim has made Portuguese sensation Geovany Quenda his No.1 choice to replace him.
Is that exclusive? God no.
But congratulations Jeremy Cross for you combined two old stories to create an ‘exclusive’ that ‘Manchester United will offload’ a player who nobody wants to sign. And we all move one day closer to the return of Premier League football.
MORE MAN UTD COVERAGE ON F365…
👉 Amorim gives Man Utd flop chance in unusual position as first XI is revealed in training session
👉 Ruben Amorim promotes Man Utd academy giant to first team as ex-Arsenal teen set for ‘fast-track’
👉 Five Premier League stars who need to buck up amid threat of January axe
Whistle-stop tour
Much has been made of Ruben Amorim’s first hands-on training session at Manchester United – in which he played Antony as a wing-back of all things – with The Sun going big:
RUBEN AMORIM’S debut training session lifted the lid on his amazing plans to restore Manchester United to the top of English football.
Well it lifts the lid on which 10 senior outfield players he had available, anyway. We do think any ‘amazing plans to restore Manchester United to the top of English football’ might have to play second fiddle to any plans to lift United out of the bottom half of the Premier League table.
Among the absolute gems from those ‘amazing plans’ are that Amorim ‘wore a bright red coat’ and ‘his bright red coat was hard to miss as he shouted words of encouragement from beginning to end’. What a man.
But this is by far our favourite observation from this or any other attempt to glean information from the training session:
Amorim made sure he commanded attention with his very own whistle.
His ‘very own whistle’? Is he 12?
So, so many questions: Is it his (very) own? Did he bring it from Lisbon? Is it club-issue? Was it Ten Hag’s, or did they spring for a new one?
Mediawatch is largely disappointed that the whistle did not match his ‘bright red coat’. Now that would have been an amazing plan…
Can you dig it?
That training session – and presumably whistle – went down a treat with Marcus Rashford, who posted on social media that it was a ‘top session today’.
That was of course a ‘three-word verdict’ (Mail and Mirror) or ‘one word to describe Man Utd training’ (Star).
Or, if you are absolutely shameless and you work for Football Insider: ‘Man United ace Marcus Rashford aims three-word dig at Erik ten Hag.’
Poor Erik. If being sacked by Manchester United wasn’t enough, he then has to suffer the indignity of one of his ex-players hailing a ‘top session today’. Will the cruelty never end?
Pasta his best
And the biggest story in football this snowy Tuesday morning according to MailOnline:
Happy to be back, Erik? Ten Hag returns to his favourite Manchester restaurant just three weeks after his brutal sacking – on the day his successor Ruben Amorim takes training for the first time
‘Just’ three weeks? Should he have waited longer before he cleared out his Cheshire home? What’s the optimum timescale?
But it’s the headline on the MailOnline football homepage that has piqued Mediawatch interest: ‘ERIK’S EMOTIONAL RETURN’.
Just how good is the pasta?
