Man Utd's new coach has awkward history Ruben Amorim may want to keep on the down-low

Ruben Amorim has brought a clan of familiar faces on board to complete his Manchester United coaching staff.

The Portuguese manager has enjoyed tremendous success in his homeland with Sporting, and five coaches are following him to Old Trafford with hopes of continuing their good work, as confirmed by the club on Saturday.

Carlos Fernandes will be Amorim’s right-hand man, as he was in Lisbon. Jorge Vital will lead the goalkeepers, Adelio Candido and Emanuel Ferro will help coach the first team, and then there is the fifth appointment – Paulo Barreira – who has something of an awkward history given his new surroundings.

Barreira’s official job title is ‘Physical performance coach’, and United extended a warm welcome to him and the four other new coaches via a statement on their official website. But he onced earned his living with the Red Devils’ bitter rivals.

Before working in Saudi Arabia and the UAE, and joining up with Amorim at Sporting, Barreira spent three years as Liverpool’s first-team physio. His recent switch to United means he has crossed the divide between one of English football’s biggest rivalries – if not the biggest.

His Anfield stint began in 2011 and ran until 2014, during which time he began in-depth sports science studies at Liverpool John Moores University, completing his PhD thesis on hamstring injury prevention in 2017.

Dr Mark Robinson, who worked with Barreira at the University, recalled: “Paulo was a physio at Liverpool FC and worked with us at LJMU to rehabilitate some of their high-profile players, including Lucas Leiva, who had a long-term injury at the time.

“We predominantly did isokinetic evaluations for them, which is essentially muscle strength assessment. He was always a very hard worker and fiercely determined to get his PhD despite having a very full-on job over at Anfield.

“He was also embracing new approaches to both athlete monitoring and rehabilitation. Paulo continues to produce high-quality research. One of his PhD papers on load monitoring in football has an impressive 118 citations.”

As if Barreira’s spell on Merseyside does not make his United move intriguing enough, he also spent a significant chunk of time with another of the club’s major rivals – Arsenal. He was the Gunners’ first-team physio between 2017 and 2020, and he now returns to the Premier League after a successful spell in Portugal with aims of getting one over his former employers.