Ruben Amorim has said Harry Maguire’s one-year option will be triggered “happily” but has warned the former captain to improve his leadership and form to help Manchester United turn around their poor results.

The head coach also said that the club were close to agreeing new terms with Amad Diallo, one of United’s best players this season. “Amad is near,” Amorim said.

Maguire, who joined from Leicester in 2019 for £80m, is suited to Amorim’s back-three formation. The triggering of the extra year on the 31-year-old’s contract, taking it to June 2026, constitutes a considerable turnaround in his fortunes after he was stripped of the captaincy by Erik ten Hag in summer 2023 and almost joined West Ham.

Amorim said: “Harry Maguire, [we are] going to trigger our option. I spoke with him this morning and I told him that he has to improve his game on the pitch. We need him a lot and also he has to improve as a leader, because we all know the situation that he had here. But we need him a lot at this moment, so we are going to happily trigger the option for Harry.”

Maguire took the armband during Monday’s 2-0 defeat by Newcastle at Old Trafford when Lisandro Martínez, deputising as captain for the suspended Bruno Fernandes, was substituted on 65 minutes. Amorim highlighted a desperate need for on-field leaders as he praised Maguire for bouncing back from difficult times.

“He coped very well with his struggles,” he said. “There are moments in the career of a player that are different. And when you look at our team, we are starving for leaders on the pitch. He is a leader, he has to improve that part, he has to improve his game, so we are happy to continue with Harry.”

Amorim indicated he was unhappy with the leadership shown by other senior players. United are 14th in the Premier League and have lost their past four matches in all competitions. “If you want to be a top, top team you have to be leaders and we have that in the dressing room,” he said. “But they have to step up. Because we have a lot of young kids also and this moment is really, really hard.

“You can look at the table but you are still Manchester United. This gap and this pressure on a big club in a really low moment is really hard to cope with, so we need the guys who are more experienced to help the others.”

Marcus Rashford is expected to miss Sunday’s trip to the leaders, Liverpool. “At the moment, he’s ill, he’s not training,” said Amorim. Rashford was left out of four match-day squads for “training reasons” before being reinstated by Amorim for the Newcastle game. He was an unused substitute and the head coach was asked whether there was any change in the status of the 27-year-old, who has admitted he wants a “new challenge”, away from the club.

Amorim said: “We’ll see in the future but he’s like a normal player; I make a selection, so it’s the same.”

Joshua Zirkzee was taken off on 33 minutes against Newcastle and seemed to be jeered by some United fans afterwards. “It is really hard for any player but that can happen, they understand it is part of football,” said Amorim. “Sometimes they have good moments in their careers, other times it does not go very well.”