‘Tough, really tough’: Ruben Amorim on his first year at Manchester United | Manchester United

Ruben Amorim has admitted his first year at Manchester United has been “really tough” but is clear he wants to be head coach for as long as possible.

Amorim was confirmed as Erik ten Hag’s successor on 1 November and officially took over 10 days later. The Portuguese has won 21 and lost 19 of his 52 games – a 40% victory rate.

“It was a journey, a big journey,” he said of his first 12 months. “It was tough, really tough, good moments and bad moments. I learned a lot that is really important. I found out that even in my lower moments I can stick with the things I believe and that is a good thing for anyone to understand. Today the answer is different from three weeks ago. One of the biggest honours of my life to be here and I want to continue here for many years.”

United have won their past three Premier League matches, against Sunderland, Liverpool and Brighton. On Saturday they travel to Nottingham Forest, led by Sean Dyche, who will take charge of his third game.

In August when not working as a manager Dyche claimed he could perform better with United’s squad than Amorim. “I bet I could win more games with that squad playing a 4-4-2,” he said.

Amorim shrugged off Dyche’s comments. “Maybe it’s true that if we play 4-4-2 we win more games,” he said. “But I always said that I have a way of playing that is going to take a while, but in the future it’s going to be better. Then I can look at Sean Dyche as a manager and then as a pundit. If you are a pundit and you don’t say very strong things, I don’t want to watch you. So I can understand that it’s a completely different job. I know that Sean Dyche is really smart and he knows how to play the game.

“He also understands that one thing is when we are seeing the game and talking about the game, the other thing is to coach a team. I have nothing to say, I just want to win the next game.”

Lisandro Martínez, who has not played since sustaining a knee injury in February, has resumed full training. Amorim said: “He wants to go to [play in] this one [Forest] – he’s not going to. He’s done training with us but we changed some things in the exercises, so slowly he’s going to get better.” Amorim said he was not certain whether Harry Maguire would be fit.

Jason Wilcox has suggested United’s 3–1 loss at Brentford on 27 September caused him to particularly scrutinise Amorim’s performance. The defeat came after Chelsea had been beaten and Amorim spoke of needing to finally win two consecutive league matches.

“The Brentford game stands out as a game in which we were extremely disappointed in the way we played,” the director of football told MUTV. “But in all the other games we’ve had moments of really good play, we’ve seen progress and we’ve got to keep this going now.”