We look ahead to Friday’s FA Cup match at Old Trafford, where Manchester United take on Leicester City. Who will come out on top between Ruben Amorim and Ruud van Nistelrooy?
Man Utd vs Leicester Stats: The Key Insights
- Manchester United are made the favourites by the Opta supercomputer, progressing without extra-time or penalties in 65.9% of the simulations.
- Ruud van Nistelrooy, now the Leicester City boss, was in charge of United when the Red Devils beat the Foxes twice earlier this season.
- This will be the fourth FA Cup meeting between Man Utd and Leicester.
Manchester United take on Leicester City at Old Trafford in the FA Cup on Friday night, throwing up a reunion between the Red Devils and old boy Ruud van Nistelrooy, who returns to a former stomping ground where he was both a player and, briefly, manager.
It was only last summer that Van Nistelrooy was appointed as Erik ten Hag’s assistant coach. Fast forward to the end of October, and the former striker was thrust into interim charge after his compatriot’s dismissal.
While United made their move for Ruben Amorim, Van Nistelrooy was tasked with steadying the ship. He was in charge for four matches in all competitions, and two of those came against Leicester at Old Trafford. The Red Devils won 5-2 in the EFL Cup, and then 3-0 in the Premier League.
But Van Nistelrooy was out the door once Amorim officially started. He wasn’t without a job for long, though. Steve Cooper was sacked by Leicester, and the Foxes confirmed Van Nistelrooy as their new boss.
Friday’s clash, then, marks Van Nistelrooy’s first meeting with his former club since his departure and first game against them as a manager. It comes on the back of a torrid performance and result against Everton in the league, losing 4-0 at Goodison Park.
Everton’s first goal was the 50th Leicester have shipped in the league this term. After 24 games, it is the earliest they have conceded a half-century of goals in the top flight since 1959-60, when they did so in their 23rd match.
Saturday’s humbling defeat came after Leicester had hit back to claim a morale-boosting 2-1 win at Tottenham, but that was a victory they failed to build on. They are now in the bottom three, two points from safety, and Van Nistelrooy has won just three games since he took over.
One of those wins came in the third round of the FA Cup, a 6-2 thrashing of Queens Park Rangers. The Foxes will be hoping this famous old trophy, which they won under Brendan Rodgers in 2021, can provide a welcome distraction to their league troubles.
The same could be said of United, though, as Amorim’s arrival has not led to a swift improvement. If anything, results in the main have got even worse, with the Red Devils finding themselves 13th in the league, meaning European qualification through their league placing looks to be a pipedream.
United had won three straight games before going down 2-0 to Crystal Palace on Sunday, suffering their seventh home defeat of the season in the top tier. It is their joint-most home losses at this stage of a league campaign, along with 1893-94.
In fact, since the beginning of last season only Wolves (16) have lost more Premier League home games than United (13).
So, there is certainly hope for Leicester, who have progressed from seven of their last eight FA Cup fourth-round ties; the other match was a 4-1 away defeat to Nottingham Forest in 2021-22.
Nevertheless, United have won 16 of their last 18 FA Cup matches at home, drawing two, with one of those draws resulting in them going out on penalties to Middlesbrough in February 2022. The last visiting side to win in normal time at Old Trafford were Arsenal in March 2015, a 2-1 victory.
Amorim has not yet managed to get consistent performances out of his team, though Amad Diallo has been a persistent bright spark. He created six chances against Palace on Sunday, which is his joint-highest figure in a Premier League match (equalling the six he created against Southampton in September).
Since Amorim’s first match in charge on 24 November, Diallo has scored six goals and provided five assists.
His tally of 11 goal contributions is two more than any of his United teammates in that time, while only Bruno Fernandes (46) has created more chances than Diallo (33) in all competitions under Amorim.
Fernandes, meanwhile, has been involved in 10 goals in his last 10 FA Cup appearances for United (seven goals, three assists), scoring their goal in the 1-1 draw with Arsenal in the third round this year, which the Red Devils won on penalties.
Man Utd vs Leicester Head-to-Head
As mentioned, United have already beaten Leicester twice this season.
United have never won three home games against one club in a season before, with Manchester City against Chelsea in 2022-23 the last time a Premier League side did so against fellow top-flight opponents.
This is the fourth FA Cup meeting between United and Leicester – the Red Devils won the first two (3-1 in the 1962-63 final, 2-1 in the 1975-76 fifth round) while the Foxes won 3-1 in the most recent game in the 2020-21 quarter-final on their way to lifting the trophy.
After a run of five games without a win against Leicester between December 2020 and April 2022, United have now won their last four meetings with the Foxes by an aggregate score of 12-2.
Man Utd vs Leicester Prediction
United are the big favourites to progress to the fifth round, winning inside 90 minutes in 65.9% of the Opta supercomputer‘s 10,000 pre-match simulations.
Leicester came out on top in regulation time in just 15.6% of our data-led simulations, while the game went to extra-time and potentially penalties 18.5% of the time.
Opta Power Rankings
The Opta Power Rankings are a global team ranking system that assigns an ability score to over 13,000 domestic football teams on a scale between zero and 100, where zero is the worst-ranked team in the world and 100 is the best team in the world.
Ahead of kick-off on Friday, here is the Opta Power Ranking for both sides.
Subscribe to our football newsletter to receive exclusive weekly content. You should also follow our social accounts over on X, Instagram, TikTok and Facebook.
