Ruben Amorim has publicly appealed for patience around Kobbie Mainoo\u2019s situation at Manchester United after a family stunt and growing media attention. The manager framed Mainoo\u2019s current role as part of a normal development process at Old Trafford, reminding observers that notable figures have not always been automatic starters.<\/p>\n
Tensions rose after Mainoo\u2019s half-brother posed in a t-shirt which read “Free Kobbie Mainoo” during the recent 4\u20134 draw with Bournemouth, a stunt that left former player Roy Keane thoroughly unimpressed. Ahead of Sunday\u2019s meeting with Aston Villa, Amorim urged restraint and work ethic from the 20-year-old.<\/p>\n
\u201cKobbie needs to fight for his job,\u201d Amorim stressed ahead of Sunday\u2019s meeting with Aston Villa. \u201cI think that it is not a bad thing to be on the bench of\u00a0Manchester United \u00a0when you are 20 years old.<\/p>\n
“I remember Ronaldo was on the bench, Rooney was on the bench sometimes. [Juan Sebasti\u00e1n] Ver\u00f3n was not playing. I remember all the history of Manchester United and nobody … So let\u2019s continue in trying to avoid the nonsense and the noise. I just want to help the team win, to help Kobbie to be a better player.\u201d<\/p>\n
Amorim has repeatedly defended his selection choices and has denied that limited use of Mainoo is a message or strategy aimed at anyone. He stressed the selection is made with match-winning priorities in mind and encouraged the young midfielder to respond on the field.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m not trying to say to Kobbie, \u2018You are a big player here, let\u2019s put him on the bench to show something\u2019,\u201d he insisted. \u201cNo, no.<\/p>\n
“What I\u2019m saying is the opposite. I\u2019m just not putting Kobbie sometimes because I understand that this is not the right guy to start the game. Maybe the next game, on Sunday, he is going to start.<\/p>\n
“If he plays well, he\u2019s going to show everyone. \u2018This guy cannot take me from the team,\u2019 and I will be so happy, so I don\u2019t care. I don\u2019t want to show nothing to anyone. I\u2019m just saying that I\u2019m trying to win games and to show to the players that if you do the things right, you will play no matter what the name.\u201d<\/p>\n
United are reportedly reluctant to sell Mainoo, who is the last remaining academy graduate in Amorim\u2019s senior squad. Club sources say his departure would harm morale and undermine United\u2019s bid to keep their 88-year streak of naming at least one homegrown player in every matchday squad.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Amorim urges patience for Kobbie Mainoo amid bench debate after ‘Free Kobbie Mainoo’ T-shirt stunt..<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5272,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1083,172],"tags":[1021,1304,1215],"class_list":["post-5273","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-man-utd","category-epl","tag-amorim","tag-benching","tag-controversy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5273","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5273"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5273\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5272"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5273"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5273"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5273"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}