From ignominy to indispensable: Why Manchester United cannot win without Casemiro

As Ruben Amorim looked back on how far a serial Champions League winner had fallen, he said: “In the beginning he was behind every midfielder, even Toby.” Toby Collyer, now on loan at Championship club West Bromwich Albion , where his starts are outnumbered by his substitute appearances, was ahead of Casemiro in the pecking order at Manchester United .

It formed part of an ignominious decline. Amorim came in and was swift to place Casemiro at the back of the queue. Erik ten Hag had brought Collyer on for the Brazilian in what seemed a personal nadir, a 3-0 defeat to Liverpool when he was at fault for two goals and hauled off at half-time.

And if the intervening period included a brief renaissance under Ruud van Nistelrooy in the autumn of 2024, it seemed unlikely the Stretford End would launch into chorus after chorus of Casemiro’s name. They did in Saturday’s 4-2 win over Brighton .

“He fought and he worked and now he's back in the national team,” said Amorim. “He's so important for us. [On Saturday] he ran a lot, he had to press so high and then return and he's doing that. So I'm really pleased with him and the other guys need to look at Casemiro.”

A year on, United have a new Casemiro problem. If, at separate points, different United managers concluded they could not play with him then, now they cannot play without him. The numbers indicate as much.

So, too, did the shift in momentum on Saturday: they were 3-0 up and cruising when Amorim replaced him with Kobbie Mainoo, and soon lost control. It was in part an indictment of the Mancunian that the manager later had to summon Manuel Ugarte to bolster his midfield and Brighton still threatened to get a 3-3 draw.

Six days earlier, United were keeping a clean sheet when Casemiro was replaced at Anfield. Conceding could be attributed to the way Liverpool adopted a policy of all-out attack thereafter but Casemiro has played 128 minutes against Liverpool and Brighton and United weren’t breached. Senne Lammens was beaten three times in the 52 minutes after he had gone off.

There is a wider trend. United have not conceded with him on the pitch since August; they have only let in three goals when he has been involved this campaign. And if that owes something to Casemiro’s sending off against Chelsea, before Enzo Maresca’s side scored, meaning he was then suspended for the defeat to Brentford, United have played 10 games this season in all competitions.

They have conceded three goals in 463 minutes with Casemiro on the pitch, or one every 154; 13 in 437 without him, or one every 33. A coincidence? It scarcely feels so. A compliment to him and a criticism of others? Definitely.

Mainoo is trapped in a malaise under Amorim, forever looking lost. Ugarte lacks Casemiro’s quality on the ball. United are always at risk of being outnumbered in the centre of the pitch, Amorim’s 3-4-3 leaving their duo likely to face a trio.

There is no hiding place; lose the midfield battle and defeat in a game can follow. And when Casemiro’s sidekick is the attack-minded Bruno Fernandes, he shoulders a huge responsibility.

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And that workload, for a player deep into his 34th year and in a team trying to press high more often, could be why Amorim has seemed to conclude that Casemiro can’t play 90 minutes any more. He has not completed a United match all season.

The drop-off to Ugarte and Mainoo (or this Mainoo, anyway, given a hapless showing on Saturday and his enduring struggles under Amorim) is huge. While they were interested in Brighton’s Carlos Baleba, it was an oddity that United did not sign in midfield in the summer, preferring instead to buy three forwards. It left Casemiro more important.

Amorim’s squad has depth in some positions – No 10, most obviously, and centre-back, because when Lisandro Martinez is fit again, they will have five or six credible options – but not in goal or, perhaps at wing-back, where Patrick Dorgu can come on and spread chaos, or in the middle of midfield.

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Which comes at a risk to a team with a limited schedule. “It's a big advantage to have just one game per week and we have to take advantage of that,” said Amorim. But they will have a three-game week in a month, against Crystal Palace, West Ham and Wolves. They face four matches in 11 or 12 days after Christmas, against Newcastle, Wolves, Leeds and Burnley.

And their talisman has had a personal renaissance when playing for about an hour a week, when he is two bookings from another ban and when they were hopeless at Grimsby and Brentford, the two matches he missed.

For much of Amorim’s reign, there has been a struggle to win games. Yet holding on to victory feels harder when Casemiro goes off; winning without him altogether appears altogether tougher. Casemiro has gone from ignominy to indispensable.