When the fourth official’s board went up on Wednesday night and the number illuminated in red was 9 there were hundreds of Manchester United fans that got to their feet and began to applaud.
Rasmus Hojlund’s head bowed, as it so often does when he’s hooked by Ruben Amorim, and he made his way off after 67 minutes as his stat line read 0 goals, 0 assists, 0 shots, 0 successful dribbles, 0 ground duels won, 0 aerial duels won and 0 fouls won.
It was another galling night for Hojlund but here he was heading back to the touchline with hundreds of his own supporters applauding him off.
On the night it was the smallest of footnotes to the dramatic 3-2 win – but it felt significant for Hojlund in a week where reports have emerged that coaches are losing patience in him as he stretched his goal drought to 17 games. So many supporters are still desperately willing him to unlock his potential.
At Everton in the previous league game – where he posted another all-nil stat line – there was suggestions from some fans in the away end that the cheers that marked his substitution, which saw 17-year-old academy star Chido Obi sent on in his place, were more to do with his exit than the teenager’s introduction.
Hojlund is taking criticism from all angles right now and that is partly why the feeling among some internally at United is one of sympathy for a 22-year-old that should not be shouldering the entire goalscoring burden in the strikers’ room at a club the size of Manchester United.
Rasmus Hojlund’s substitution was greeted with applause despite his woes in front of goal
It is now 17 games since Hojlund last found the back of the net but fans are still willing him on
The struggling forward is largely shouldering the goal-scoring burden alone in this United side
In United’s heyday that was a job divided up between Andy Cole, Dwight Yorke, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and Teddy Sheringham.
In more recent times that burden has fallen upon Wayne Rooney and Robin van Persie. Or Carlos Tevez. Or Dimitar Berbatov. Or Zlatan Ibrahimovic. Or Edinson Cavani. All bursting with top level experience that Hojlund severely lacks.
Club sources speak of his willingness to learn in training and his attitude having never faltered amid his barren run but others talk of a player that has had confidence smashed to smithereens during this miserable campaign.
‘He has not scored in the last 11 Premier League games and once again he is completely invisible,’ Danish tabloid BT said of Hojlund’s performance against Ipswich on Wednesday night.
‘He never becomes dangerous – and does not contribute to tying the game together. Poor performance from the Dane, who will soon have to prove something before United will most likely sign a new striker this summer.’
As one of the younger members of the dressing room and one who is actively on Instagram, the rhetoric around his struggles won’t have been lost on Hojlund, either, further compounding everything.
The biggest issue for United and Hojlund is that Amorim has no alternative option to take him out of the firing line.
Hojlund ranks ninth for minutes played at United this season and, at least until the end of the season, is going to have to find a way to compartmentalise his miserable form to ride the storm out until the season’s close.
The Manchester United sides of yesteryear had no shortage of goal scoring options in attack
Meanwhile in the current side Amorim has few options to turn to in order to get United firing
The handling of Hojlund is interesting given that Amorim looks to have tried tough love before now shifting more to encouragement and a softer style.
In the 3-1 comeback win over Southampton at Old Trafford, Amorim was incensed with one passage of play where Hojlund lost an aerial duel. His boss swiftly took him off.
Aerial duels have been a real blot against Hojlund’s name this season for a player who has made a habit – not a good one – of backing into defenders… and losing out.
In fact, he has won just 17/80 (21.25 per cent) of his aerial duels, putting him 144th of Premier League players this season. That is the lowest of any striker to play at least 900 minutes this season.
‘He has clearly lost confidence,’ former United defender Rio Ferdinand said of Hojlund’s duelling struggles pre-Ipswich.
‘One of the things about Hojlund that I get frustrated about when I see him is that he always tries to fight the defenders and create contact.
‘Sometimes you have to free yourself from contact, so when you have someone coming at you, it’s easier to take the ball and get into the spaces where you can influence the game, between the posts and in the box.’
Anxiety has got hold of Hojlund now. That’s one of the biggest problems.
One of the biggest problems now though is that anxiety seems to have caught hold of Hojlund
There is an argument though that the Dane is being put in a position that he should not be in
There were numerous occasions against Ipswich where his run took him into an alley lined with defenders, ensuring there was little to no chance of a pass coming his way.
And for all the sympathisers – which include Amorim – of Hojlund, there is a growing number in the fan-base that are no longer buying into the argument that he gets a lack of service. More and more are growing weary of his trait to mark himself out of the contest.
But there is validity in that Hojlund is a player in a position he should not be. At 22 he is Manchester United’s No 9 with nobody to lean on and learn from. There is nobody to take the pressure off him and the vicious cycle has shown no sign of abating.
Riddled with anxiety he is constantly on the periphery of games in a team that create so few chances. How he is meant to snap himself out of this funk is a mystery to everyone, truthfully.
In the Premier League since the start of 2025, just look at Hojlund’s stat lines:
- Liverpool (A) – 17 touches | 4 in opposition box | 1 shot
- Southampton (H) – 17 touches | 3 in opposition box | 1 shot
- SUB: Brighton (H) – 2 touches | 0 in opposition box | 0 shots
- Fulham (A) – 20 touches | 1 in opposition box | 0 shots
- SUB: Crystal Palace (H) – 10 touches | 2 in opposition box | 1 shot
- Tottenham (A) – 23 touches | 5 in opposition box | 3 shots
- Everton (A) – 12 touches | 3 in opposition box | 0 shots
- Ipswich (H) – 12 touches | 1 in opposition box | 0 shots
Across six league starts in this run he has had five shots.
Expand shot totals out across the entire league and you see the Premier League’s unanimous MVP (Most Valuable Player) Mohamed Salah at No 1 with 101 shots.
The Premier League’s MVP Mohamed Salah has 101 shots – stark comparison to Hojlund’s 16
Cole Palmer (Chelsea) and Erling Haaland (Man City) are second with 97; Bournemouth’s Antoine Semenyo is next with 94, while Wolves’ Matheus Cunha is fifth with 86 shots this season.
Hojlund’s 16 shots – which leaves him behind team-mate and centre back Lisandro Martinez (17), Casemiro (21) and Alejandro Garnacho (57) – ranks him as 158th.
‘I think Rasmus has a lot of potential,’ Amorim said at the start of this week.
‘If we improve the way we play the game he will have more opportunities to score.
‘He came here very young and when you’re young to be the No 9 and play all the time, sometimes it’s hard. It’s everything together. The context.
‘We have to look at Rasmus as a player — he has pace and he has the technique, he scores some goals that are really hard to score. Sometimes he didn’t choose the better run, sometimes he’s so anxious to touch the ball because he goes a lot of minutes without the ball and he moves away from the goal where he’s supposed to be, especially in the final third.
‘We address that in training and sometimes it has to be the confidence of the player but especially the way we play.’
And that word ‘confidence’ feels the real difference maker now to the player we saw at the start of 2024 that was among the most in-form marksmen in the league, so much so he was crowned Premier League Player of the Month in February 2024 after five goals and an assist in four games.
Hojlund earned an impressive Player of the Month gong during a five-game spell last year
Hojlund is contracted until 2028 but it is likely that patience and sympathy may not last as long
He is a shell of that now and it is going to take an almighty effort to coax that care-free, relaxed, and confident back out after 17 consecutive games without a goal.
Hojlund walked through the door with just one season of experience in one of Europe’s top five leagues where he managed nine goals for Atalanta in Serie A from 32 games.
And so there may be sympathy, there may even be patience given he is under contract until 2028, but neither sentiment will last forever.
At a crossroads in his Manchester United career, Hojlund could do worse than watch those five games back from a year ago to see a young player smiling, a young player thriving and a young player scoring and realise he is far from the lost cause many want to paint him out as.
‘It’s more of a team thing than a Rasmus thing,’ Amorim admitted. ‘If we improve, Rasmus will improve, and I have that feeling.’
