JOSE MOURINHO encouraged Ruben Amorim to take the jump from Sporting Lisbon to Manchester United.
The Fenerbahce and former Red Devils boss has been a long time mentor to Amorim who had an internship at Mourinho’s High Performance Football Coaching course back in 2018.
Jose Mourinho has backed his former trainee to take up Manchester United’s offer
Ruben Amorim looks set to replace sacked Erik ten Hag at Old Trafford
The pair have remained close and so he was the person the 39-year-old turned to when he became aware of United’s interest.
SunSport also understands that Amorim wants to delay his move to United until after Sporting play Manchester City in the Champions League in Lisbon next Tuesday.
His next match is at home on Friday to Estrela.
It seems certain that interim boss Ruud van Nistelrooy will therefore be in charge for not only the Leicester City Carabao Cup game but also the visit of Chelsea to Old Trafford on Sunday.
United have agreed to pay Amorim’s £8.5million release clause.
But the club want a further £4.1million for him to take his Sporting backroom staff with him.
The sticking point, however, is that Sporting are looking to promote his assistant Carlos Fernandez to Amorim’s post despite him being only 29.
While there are reports that Sporting will hold Amorim to a 30-day notice period the coach is convinced he will be at Old Trafford next week.
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He has agreed to a two-and-a-half year contract with the option on the United’s side to extend that by a further year.
Amorim had already been spoken to by United’s hierarchy before firing Erik ten Hag on Monday morning.
The man himself immediately turned to Mourinho for advice.
Despite his own dismissal by the club in his third season ‘The Special One’ encouraged him to make the move.
Mourinho backed him when he was linked to the West Ham job.
Mourinho said: “I think he has the conditions to be able to coach in any league and he has the conditions to be able to coach in any club.”
Amorim for his part once referred to Mourinho as a ‘reference point’ and said of him:
“Mourinho is one of a kind. There won’t be another Mourinho. Mourinho is unique.”
Ruben Amorim is ‘Mourinho 2.0’ who turned Sporting from ‘walking dead’ into Portuguese champs… he can revive Man Utd
WHEN Ruben Amorim took charge of Sporting Lisbon in March 2020, one club official compared their situation to the “walking dead”, writes Jordan Davies.
Optimism and hope was at an all-time low.
But the Amorim-effect was almost instantaneous, guiding the Portuguese sleeping giants to their first league title for 19 years in 2020/21, losing just once and only conceding 20 goals.
Since then, Sporting have lifted another league title in 2023/24 – as well as two League Cups – and currently sit top with nine wins from nine this term.
He may be young, but Amorim already has an eye for rebuilding and revitalising fallen super powers with his infectious charisma and intense tactical philosophy that hardly ever wavers.
The “walking dead” at Manchester United must be praying for a similar sort of revival.
And they may just get it from one of the most talented young coaches on the continent – a man accustomed to breathing new life back into crumbling institutions such as Old Trafford.
Amorim has spent the last decade dreaming of one day gracing England’s Premier League, such was his admiration for an ex-United boss in Jose Mourinho growing up.
Often nicknamed ‘Mourinho 2.0’, Amorim spent a week with his coaching idol in an internship capacity at United’s Carrington training base in 2018, going on to cite him as his “reference point”.
United should not be expecting a mini-Mourinho, as Amorim said himself: “Mourinho is one of a kind. There won’t be another Mourinho. Mourinho is unique.”
And yet, you cannot help but compare the two.
For all the mismanagement in the Old Trafford hot seats over the years, this would be a real get – finally a slap in the face United’s Prem rivals have no answer for.