A lack of leadership in the Manchester United dressing room has hurt Ruben Amorim’s start at the club – but one Old Trafford icon recounted how it can lead to players getting special treatment
It’s no secret that Manchester United is suffering from a lack of leaders, which Ruben Amorim has learnt first-hand.
The same scarcity of experienced senior talents has affected the new manager, just as it did his predecessor, Erik ten Hag. United have lost three games in a row ahead of Monday’s Premier League clash at home to Newcastle, with the Red Devils squad searching for talismanic figures to take the bull by the horns and cease their latest slide.
Standout stars can have a mixed impact, however, and Dimitar Berbatov once recounted how Cristiano Ronaldo demanded certain treatment from his club. Not necessarily through his words, however, as the Bulgarian detailed how Ronaldo’s aura was enough to make others behave differently in his presence.
“In football, there is a hierarchy when someone like Ronaldo comes into the team, you give him the respect he deserves,” he told Mirror Football in 2022. “It is all there, all that he has achieved, and I think it’s up to him to speak to the players and give them advice and help them develop.”
Berbatov, 43, hailed his former team-mate’s professionalism and the way in which he carried himself. According to him, Ronaldo “never missed a training sessions” and was “always sure of himself and his quality.”
That air of confidence and dedication clearly seeped into the rest of the team, considering Ronaldo’s stay at Old Trafford coincided with major success under Sir Alex Ferguson. In his six seasons at United, the Portugal captain won three Premier League titles, the Champions League, a FIFA Club World Cup, one FA Cup and two League Cups.
He also claimed the first of his five Ballons d’Or in 2008, the year Berbatov joined United and one year before his record-breaking move to Real Madrid. Though Berbatov only played a single season alongside the all-time great, it provided enough of a glimpse to understand why Ronaldo commanded a higher place in the squad pecking order.
Not that he would have been the first United player to receive special treatment from United legend Ferguson. It’s widely understood that former bad boy Eric Cantona was spared from Ferguson’s usual strict methods due to the value he provided elsewhere, which helped drive high standards while occasionally falling afoul of the authorities.
And incumbent Amorim would perhaps be just as open to yielding certain allowances with the squad’s current leaders. Or at least he might if those figures were more apparent.
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