EAGLE-EYED Manchester United fans spotted an amazing tactical switch made by Ruben Amorim involving Bruno Fernandes in the dying minutes of their FA Cup third round clash with Arsenal.
United went into extra-time with ten man at the Emirates following Diogo Dalot's red card in the 61st minute and were desperately holding on to ensure the game went to penalties.
However, deep into injury time and having played almost an hour of football a player down, Amorim gave the green light for a desperate tactical switch.
Fernandes, who had scored the Red Devils opener, was seen running over to his manager to discuss something.
As Fernandes then ran back into the middle of the pitch, Amorim could then be seen waving his finger in both directions before the subject of the chat became clear.
Fernandes, 30, was seen filling in at left centre-back role for the final minutes of the game, with Lisandro Martinez bizarrely moving up front as part of a shuffling of the pack.
The Argentine defender was reportedly beginning to cramp up due to the astonishing workload.
But the change saw Martinez move up front and seemingly stick close to Gunners star Martin Odegaard to lessen his burden for the final few minutes before the shootout.
The bold move paid dividends as the 26-year-old went on to score, while Fernandes himself also scored the first of United's five successful spot-kicks in the shootout.
Reacting to the change on social media, one fan said: "Ruben Amorim tactical mastermind! He reorganises the team deep into extra time! Martinez up front."
A second said: "Martinez playing up front for the last five mins was the funniest thing ever."
A third added: "Martinez playing higher up due to injury."
Another said: "[Fernandes] Spoke with Amorim then ran back and shuffled the team and made Martinez go up top where he doesn't have to run a lot.
"This happened around last few mins of the game, after running his heart out for 120 minutes and scoring that amazing goal. I love him."
Fernandes has played as an emergency defender for the Red Devils before, famously doing so during United's 4-3 FA Cup quarter-final win over Liverpool last season.
Speaking to Sky Sports following the win over Arsenal, he said: "It’s really easy when you don’t get results, when you don’t get performances to start losing belief in everything you’ve been doing.
"That’s a good thing about the team is that we kept belief on what we are doing, how we are training and where we want to go as a team and what we want to improve as a team.
"Every time you lose, or something goes wrong everyone has an opinion on what you should do differently.
“Obviously, the manager has his own idea, and he really believes in this, so there is no way that he makes you not believe it.
"Everything he says to you, everything he tries to pass you, he does it in a way that we really believe in what we are doing.
"Even in games where you concede a goal or have a setback, he just wants us to understand that the things we are doing will result if we do them in the right way. That’s the most important thing."
United, who are the holders of the competition, were pitted at home against Leicester for the fourth round that will see Ruud van Nistelrooy return to Old Trafford.
The Red Devils icon had a brief interim spell in charge of the team before Amorim took over following the sacking of Erik ten Hag.
But first United have a Premier League clash against Southampton to contest with and to try and improve their 13th place standing.
Olilatonny95
8
I saw that scene, and all some Arsenal players became confuse and thought Bruno was coaching then