Manchester United: Sir Jim Ratcliffe sent 'prayer' plea by Red Devils director as Ruben Amorim future discussed

Manchester United director of football Jason Wilcox is 'praying' for Sir Jim Ratcliffe to make a particular decision over his own future and that of under-fire head coach Ruben Amorim.

The Red Devils have picked up where they left off after a disastrous 2024-25 season, languishing in the bottom half of the Premier League table owing to a set of mediocre early-season results.

Amorim has only overseen one victory from four games in the current campaign - an unconvincing 3-2 home win over newly-promoted Burnley - in addition to one draw and two defeats in the top flight.

The Red Devils managed to give a good account of themselves in their 1-0 defeat to Arsenal on the opening weekend, but they underwhelmed in a 1-1 draw with Fulham and put up little fight in a 3-0 loss to Manchester City last time out.

Amid Man United's current on-field crisis, minority stakeholder Ratcliffe is understood to have flown into Manchester on Thursday for talks at Carrington, where Amorim's future was allegedly a topic of discussion.

Wilcox makes Ratcliffe Man United plea amid Amorim future uncertainty

The Portuguese joked that Ratcliffe offered him a new contract during their face-to-face talks, while also stressing that the INEOS chief offered him his support and that their meeting was purely to discuss "normal things".

Now, director of football Wilcox - whose decisions have also come under fire alongside those of CEO Omar Berrada - has insisted that his team can make Man United successful again and will do so with ample time.

"I just pray that we get the opportunity to turn it around and I really feel that it's not will we win again, it's when we'll win again," the Daily Mail quotes Wilcox as saying during a recent public Q&A.

"It has been a rollercoaster! I came in last April, around 18 months ago, and it's been a real challenge I can't lie. I thought the club was in a much better place than it was.

"We had no football identity, we lacked alignment between ownership, the CEO, football and the academy and we've just been working so hard behind the scenes."

Does Amorim deserve more time at Man United?

One can sympathise with Amorim. A young manager, with no Premier League experience, walking into one of the most pressurised jobs in sport at a time where the club were only on a downward trajectory.

Teething problems were inevitable, especially as the players who were indoctrinated in Erik ten Hag's ways tried to acclimatise to Amorim's 3-4-3 system, one which most of the squad were unfamiliar with.

Amorim has affirmed that he will not do away with the philosophy and approach that made him such a hit in Portugal, but with just 18 victories from 47 matches in charge, it is becoming increasingly difficult to retain faith in his methods.

Man United's two-man midfield is too easy to overrun - especially with Bruno Fernandes being shoe-horned into a deeper role - and the club would have surely been better off bolstering their engine room rather than capturing all of Bryan Mbeumo, Benjamin Sesko and Matheus Cunha.

Marcus Rashford's brace for Barcelona against Newcastle United in the Champions League was another blow for Amorim, whose stubbornness should cost him a job if results do not improve fast.