Benjamin Sisko: The Manchester United striker should not take criticism personally – Amorim

Manchester United boss Ruben Amorim admitted £73.7m striker Benjamin Sisko struggled at times in his first few weeks at the club but urged him not to take criticism from club legends personally.

Cisco scored two goals in his first 11 matches for United.

He last found the back of the net against Sunderland at Old Trafford on October 4, and his performance at Nottingham Forest last weekend prompted former captain Gary Neville to declare that the Slovenian international “falls way behind” compared to fellow new arrivals Mateusz Cunha and Brian Mbeumo.

Amorim accepts that there is substance to Neville’s comments. However, he also feels they lack the context of Cisco moving to a new league at the age of 22, having spent just two seasons in the Bundesliga with RB Leipzig.

“I’m relieved,” he said. “[But] He’s not comfortable.

“I understand how things are in football and he will struggle. This is normal. He has no experience here.

“The first effect [is] When everyone says you’re so good, you’re the next big thing and you hear that about Cisco.

“Then you come to a club that’s the hardest. If you don’t perform every week, you’ll hear a lot of things from club legends, from pundits, from the media – and sometimes they’re right.”

“Of course, no one likes to hear but he suffered a little bit, and that’s a fact. So, let’s accept it.

He added, “It is difficult to hear this, but it is not a personal matter. It is an opinion that will change in three weeks. Everything that is true today, in three weeks, could be a lie.”

Cisco is understood to be spending a significant amount of time at United’s Carrington training ground as he gets to know his performance levels compared to those required of him.

He often arrives more than 90 minutes before the usual meeting time of 09:45 and does not leave until 16:00, much later than most of his teammates.

United sources remain confident they made the right decision to sign Sisco, while at the same time sending Rasmus Hoglund on loan to Napoli, even though the Dane has scored four goals in nine appearances for the Italian champions.

“Ben is a little kid, a control freak,” Amorim said.

“He wants to control everything, and he won’t control everything.

“He has more potential than I thought [but] We need to understand how he likes to play and also put forward our ideas.

“I’m very comfortable with that. He will be our striker in the long term, but he will face these difficulties and bumps during the journey. This is a normal thing in football.”