Ruben Amorim urged Diogo Dalot to get tighter to Son Heung-min. Less than a minute later, Dalot was still too narrow and Son's volley wreaked havoc, eventually leading to James Maddison's decisive tap-in.

Failure to take on those instructions typifies the defeatist mentality of this Manchester United squad. They have no hope of mastering Amorim's 3-4-2-1 system if they cannot master routine orders.

Dalot is one of the senior statesmen and the first to approach the United supporters before every game, tribally beating his chest and clutching his fists. He needed to be as intense approaching Son. He wasn't and it cost United.

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Amorim's shoulders slumped, he outstretched his arms in disbelief at United's positioning and Casemiro's looseness with the ball. He constantly had to reposition the players and complained to his staff about a squandered overload.

The United coach also berated Rasmus Hojlund for being flagged offside. Hojlund was filmed grinning, or grimacing, sheepishly. Some will dismiss that as an innocent expression. Others will take a dim view of a striker who has now gone 15 games without a goal.

At full-time, Amorim slapped his thighs against his legs before he embraced Ange Postecoglou. United have failed to score in ten matches this season and it is two successive league defeats.

The United players and staff were still applauded gratefully by those in the away section. They had 12 players missing through injury and illness. Losing at Spurs in that context is hardly a disgrace. Yet United have lost three times to the worst Tottenham team since Christian Gross took the tube to White Hart Lane in 1997 within five months.

A banner in the away end read 'We want our club back'. On the other side of the segregation, Spurs fans unfurled their own message to the ownership: 'Our game is about glory, Levy's game is about greed'. "We want Levy out" was aired in the third minute. There was a sit-in protest at full-time.

The club United fans are likely to get back is of a 1974 vintage. United have not lost this many matches after 25 games since they were relegated in 1973-74.

They will head to Goodison Park next week below Everton in the table for only the second time since David Moyes was in the away dugout in April 2014. Perhaps the Grim Reaper will reappear in the main stand.

It is now 12 Premier League defeats this season for United - two shy of the 14 last season - and nine defeats in 21 games under Amorim. Amorim applauded the players encouragingly as full-time loomed, acknowledging their undeniable effort and enterprise. United had 16 attempts and Guglielmo Vicario made six saves.

The 3,038 United followers supported their club defiantly, singing the Calypso on the hour. If Alejandro Garnacho had rediscovered his shooting boots then United might have avoided a domestic treble of losses to Tottenham.

Garnacho does not turn 21 until July but this was his 124th appearance for United. He did not lack for commitment, stretching every sinew to block a clearance and practically brushing Patrick Dorgu to one side to sting Vicario's right palm.

Despite the lowly scoreline, much of the game was nigh-on identical to the League Cup quarter-final between the teams on the same turf in December. United trailed to a conversion on the rebound and created the clearer openings. The crucial difference was Tottenham never got the two-goal advantage. They did not need to.

This was the tenth game of the campaign United have failed to score in and both of their £108.5million strikers were in the starting line-up. Joshua Zirkzee's approach play was silky at times yet he fluffed his sole goalscoring chance with a header.

United were late arriving at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium and their entrance coincided with confirmation of the dreaded team news. The list of substitutes was a throwback to the benches Sir Alex Ferguson used to pick in Nineties League Cup ties that he practically threw.

Eight of the United substitutes had not played for the club before kick-off and nobody on the bench was in their twenties. The 30-year-old Victor Lindelof was the substitutes' babysitter. The substitutes' squad numbers added up to 393.

Amorim did not make a change until the 90th minute. Five substitutes were told to warm up again as late as the 70th minute, with the starting XI ploughing on. Tottenham made all five substitutions by the time Chido Obi emerged.

Five United substitutes paced up and down the touchline were called back, took their seats and sat down in the 79th minute. The prolific Obi was then on his feet again, pounding the muddied turf, awaiting a debut. He turned into a ball boy, fetching it for Dorgu. Obi, with the number 56 below his name, crossed the white line in added time.

It was only last week that the United reserves coach Travis Binnion remarked that Sekou Kone was not physical enough for second-string football. Kone arrived to some fanfare on transfer deadline day in August and was photographed with the technical director Jason Wilcox.

Wilcox was responsible for up to four recruits in the squad: Dorgu, Kone, Obi and Ayden Heaven. United will need more senior recruits in the summer.

And for the senior statesmen to listen to instructions.