Ruben Amorim believes the season will be a “rollercoaster” for Manchester United as he expects they will remain inconsistent, with lots of ups and downs.

United came within 10 minutes of losing at home to bottom club Southampton on Thursday, before being rescued by Amad Diallo, who scored a late hat-trick.

Amorim’s sides have secured fine away results against some of the top teams, winning a Manchester derby, drawing at Liverpool and knocking Arsenal out of the FA Cup, but have also lost three of their last four matches at Old Trafford.

And, after inheriting a group of players signed by other managers without much time on the training ground to get them accustomed to his style of play, Amorim feels United could stay an unpredictable team, rather than one who muster an extended winning run.

“I think it's going to be hard until the end of the season,” he admitted. “It's going to be a little bit of that rollercoaster. Then it depends on the time you have to train.

:We are still in the cup and we have UEFA games for the Europa League. Then it's important also to focus on next Thursday to win and to try to be in that top eight.

“In that way you can take two games from the schedule and have a full week so we are trying to do everything at the same time. We had seven trainings [training sessions] together in 14, 15 games. It's really hard, but we have to continue and try to win it. Sometimes playing good, sometimes playing bad. We will try to win games.”

Amorim feels part of the reason for United’s inconsistency at Old Trafford is that they have tended to be better on the counter-attack under previous managers, but can find it harder to break down deep defences.

“This is something that you can see from the past,” he added. “We were in the past a team of transition and we still are. You can feel it. To create chances in the final third, we struggle a lot. But for that I think it's the most, I said it before the game, the most difficult moment to train is against slow blocks, trying to create situations.

“So I think it's a team that feels more joy to play, waiting for the play and then in transition creating problems. So it's something that we have to change. To change we need training. So to have time to change, also we need to win games, we try to do that.”

United also conceded to another set-piece against Southampton and Amorim believes that is a further example of why their form could remain erratic. “This season is going to be like that and we have to improve in all the areas of our game,” he added.