Luke Shaw has suffered another “setback” in his bid to recover from injury for Manchester United.
The England left-back has not featured this season after picking up an injury in pre-season, and his only start since February was for the Three Lions in the Euro 2024 final.
And Shaw continues to struggle to overcome a calf problem, with Erik ten Hag revealing a new blow for the player before the club sacked him on Monday.
“The process is not going as we expected, that's the truth,” Ten Hag said after the defeat to West Ham.
“The setback, if you want to call it like this, we want also to do it very careful. When he is now dropping again, we want to be very careful.
“We know his past, we have to do this right, because we want him to be available, because he will have a big impact on our performances and also on our levels.
“We can't have him playing for some games and then drop out again. So, we will do it very carefully.”
Shaw will hope to recover quickly to be able to impress Ten Hag’s successor at Old Trafford.
The Independent understands the Portuguese boss Ruben Amorim wants to take over at United, having impressed in charge of Sporting.
Amorim is set to take charge of Sporting against Nacional in the Portuguese league cup on Tuesday night, in what is being viewed as potentially his last game for the club.
United first contacted the 39-year-old’s camp at the start of October - before the last international break - where they were initially expected to sack Erik ten Hag in a London meeting of the club’s hierarchy. Amorim was immediately open to the idea of managing United.
But club representatives came away believing there were two potential issues. One was that the coach’s preference was to leave Sporting at the end of the season and the other was the size of the clause, which could bring a fee of up to €20m.
Amorim’s representatives have even floated the idea of agreeing a deal where he joins United at the end of the season - but United’s new football leadership have been adamant they want Amorim to start as soon as possible.
