Man Utd legends AGREE with Richard Hughes about Ruben Amorim

Liverpool made a bold call in recruiting Arne Slot as Jurgen Klopp's successor in 2024, but the more time passes, the more it becomes apparent just how genius a decision it was from the club.

Finding someone with a similar demeanour to Klopp was always going to be challenging. After all, the German is one of the best man-managers we've ever seen in football. The relationships that he developed with the players during his time on Merseyside have had a lasting impact in the team.

But stylistically, it was important to get the right balance. Asking the squad to play and entirely new style of football felt like too much of an ask, but you also wanted to see progression from the tired formation that fans and rival teams were accustomed to. Slot's vision was perfect for our needs.

However, things could have been drastically different if an alternative candidate was appointed, who now happens to be Manchester United's head coach. The Red Devils have sunk to an all-time low.

Liverpool avoided United's fatal decision

It's well-known by now that Liverpool had in engaged in talks with Ruben Amorim prior to Slot joining.

The Portuguese coach's record at Sporting was incredible, although whether his success could be transferred over to the Premier League was unknown. Furthermore, his style of playing involved a three-at-the-back system which would've meant abandoning Klopp's tried and tested formation.

Ordinarily, a system that uses potentially five defenders is considered overly defensive and Liverpool's squad was in a better position to look at different iterations of the 4-3-3 method.

Changing the transfer policy to look at wing-backs and finding a midfield double-pivot that is capable of delivering the workload of a three-man trio is quite a lot of work to facilitate a manager.

In the end, the Reds' sporting director Richard Hughes felt it was best to look elsewhere, at Slot.

Manchester United, however, took the plunge following Erik Ten Hag's departure and now that they've committed to playing Amorim's way - which is proving to be unsuccessful - they're in all sorts of trouble. The long-term consequences of their actions will be significant.

Even though Amorim's job isn't being called into question by the executive hierarchy at United yet, it's clear that a lot of people have concerns about him. He's refusing to be flexible with his system.

Red Devil legends Paul Scholes and Nicky Butt spoke on their podcast The Good, The Bad & The Football this week (via The Times) about Amorim's immediate future and what needs to happen.

Butt said: "If me and Scholes were in charge, we'd say, right our jobs on the line here and we've got to get some wins somehow... And it's not working, the system, so my thought would be, let's go and get two or three results any way we can, but he's gone so far now [by advocating the system, that he can't go back.

"The manager seems to be so obsessed with playing this way and if he keeps it up, and does not win games, he won't have a chance to do it because he's going to be gone. It's a fact."

Investing in the Amorim way of playing is all well and good, but for teams like Liverpool and United, it's almost the polar-opposite of the style of play you'd expect. Hughes managed to steer the Reds clear of falling into the trap of making such a drastic change; United decided to go the other way.

And now they're paying the price. How long Amorim has left in his current role is uncertain. Recent history suggests that a Liverpool win at Anfield over United on Sunday could lead to an immediate sacking, but they've committed to seeing out the project, so perhaps he's un-sackable right now.

Regardless of what happens, United are set-up for playing this system for the foreseeable - a trap that Liverpool fortunately managed to avoid. To say we've got away with one is an understatement.

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