MANCHESTER, England (AP) — Manchester United needs to win seven of its eight remaining Premier League games this season just to match its worst-ever points total in the modern era.
That's how bad it's got for the record 20-time English champion in a crisis-hit campaign.
“We have to get it right fast,” head coach Ruben Amorim said after Tuesday's 1-0 defeat to Nottingham Forest.
United’s lowest points total since the Premier League began in 1992 was 58 in the 2021-22 season. It is currently on 37, with 24 more points to play for.
Seven wins would give Amorim’s team the 21 points needed to reach 58.
To put that in context, United has not won back-to-back games in the league all season. The last time it managed that was in the final two games of the previous campaign.
Amorim, meanwhile, has only won six and lost nine of his 19 league games since taking over in November. United has won 10 in total.
New lows
The loss to Forest was United's 13th in the league this term. Last year's total of 14 defeats was the club's worst in the Premier League era.
Amorim said in January that this might be the worst team in United's history and things have only got worse since then.
While there is little danger this season of one of the world's most storied teams being relegated from the top flight for the first time since 1974, it will almost certainly hit new lows in the modern era.
United's lowest league position in the Premier League was the eighth-place finish overseen by former manager Erik ten Hag last year. It seems unlikely Amorim will be able to better that, with his team 13th in the standings and 10 points below eighth-place Brighton.
Based on form, the likelier scenario is United finishes the season even lower than it already is, with Tottenham, Everton and West Ham all within touching distance.
Years of decline
This season continues United's onfield decline since managerial great Alex Ferguson retired in 2013 after winning the club's last league title.
It was his and United's 13th championship of the first 20 years of the Premier League. The club hasn't won another since.
Its lowest finish in the Premier League under Ferguson was third.
Goal drought
Among United's many problems this season have been a lack of goals. The Forest game was the 11th time it has failed to score in the league - prompting a desperate Amorim to play center back Harry Maguire in attack as he went in search of a late equalizer.
Maguire came closer than any of his teammates to scoring when seeing a stoppage time effort cleared off the line.
“We deserved more in this game, that is clear, but it was our fault. We need to be better in the last third," Amorim said.
Rasmus Hojlund, a striker signed from Atalanta for $82 million last season, has only scored eight goals in his 41 games in all competitions this term.
Strike partner Joshua Zirkzee has scored six in 45 appearances. United has scored 37 in the league all season with a goal difference of minus-4.
Amorim, however, insists he sees improvement.
“I don’t lie to myself," he said. "Everybody can say whatever they want to say, I see some things, but we need to win games.”
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James Robson is at https://twitter.com/jamesalanrobson
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AP soccer: https://apnews.com/hub/soccer
James Robson, The Associated Press
