Bruno Fernandes is now a liability for Man United. With the damage he does to those around him, Ruben Amorim must consider his future, writes GRAEME SOUNESS

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Ruben Amorim has many major calls to make going forward and arguably one of the biggest ones is does Bruno Fernandes have a future at Manchester United.

Fernandes is easily their most talented player with the ball. He is up there with anyone else in the Premier League at being able to play that killer ball but the rest of his game is lacking in a big way.

From his antics when the game is not going well to constantly throwing arms in the air, shrugging his shoulders at teammates - and he wears the armband.

What example does he set for Kobbie Mainoo, Amad Diallo and Alejandro Garnacho, young players all making their way in the game?

You want your captain, your leader, to be setting an example for everyone in that dressing room, that is why you pick him as your captain because he leads by example.

Having all that wonderfully creative picture in your head and being able to deliver on it, he certainly, certainly has and I am sure there isn't a day in training, watching the small-sided games, when the manager and his coaching staff aren't nudging each other going 'wow' when Fernandes has the ball. But I think he has become a liability for Manchester United.

Bruno Fernandes, despite his role as captain, does not set an example for Man United players

The Portuguese playmaker received his third red card of the season in their trip to Wolves

Ruben Amorim (right) will have to make a decision on Fernandes' United future

He has undoubted talent and he will be thinking he should be playing for the very best teams out there but he is not and he is showing a negativity which will be damaging to those around him - as with the sending off against Wolves.

I don't believe he a nasty player but these actions are born out of frustration. That's three times he has been sent off this season, and we are in December.

I will never get the image out of my head of how he reacted to going three goals down at Liverpool when Manchester United lost 7-0 at Anfield. 

He just threw the towel in, walking around pointing fingers at his teammates, shrugging shoulders. For the oldies that read this, I will quote the Billy Ocean song: 'When the going gets tough, the tough get going.' But Fernandes doesn't.

His actions at Anfield showed me where his mental toughness was, nowhere. And that's my point, just having ability isn't enough to be a top player, he needs to show mental toughness, discipline and workrate when you're up against it and that's certainly what United are at the moment.

In successful dressing rooms, his negative reactions to his teammates' shortcomings would have been ironed out in the very first week of training. The big players would have been all over him in training, physically and verbally, that is 'Shut the f*** up and have some of that. And by the way have some of this!'

I was never part of a team that threw the towel in, I was always fortunate to be in teams that had strong characters.

When I was made captain at Liverpool, our coach Joe Fagan pulled me aside and said 'do nothing different, do your own job first, if it's going well, then help those around you'. It was never about pointing fingers at your mates when things weren't going well. 

He has undoubted talent and he will be thinking he should be playing for the very best teams

His actions at Anfield, after losing 7-0, showed me where his mental toughness was, nowhere

Being captain you felt more of a responsibility yourself when it wasn't going well to try and put it right but I was lucky as in my Liverpool teams we had four or five captains who were inspirational figures. Do Manchester United have any of the above in their dressing room right now?

Looking and listening at the new manager talk about 'surviving' and watching his body language, he now fully realises the size of the task to put this giant football club back on track.

They've got in form Newcastle next, their biggest rivals Liverpool after that and an Arsenal team firing on all cylinders but now playing without their biggest threat in Bukayo Saka. It isn't going to get any easier any time soon for United.

How has City's downfall happened? 

I can't recall any big team falling off a cliff in the way Manchester City have. That's now one win in 13 games.

Anyone with interest in our Premier League will be questioning how has this happened?

This is not the reaction of big players, players who have dominated the hardest domestic league in the world over the last four years, so what's gone wrong?

Any big team can lose to anyone, that's the beauty of our league. But this run City are on has left everyone including their biggest rivals scratching their heads. 

Manchester City have now won just one of their last 13 matches in all competitions

Pep Guardiola is struggling to find a solution to his side's woes as they head into the new year

Big players don't lose their technical ability to win matches but what they can lose is that desire and intensity around doing the hard yards 100percent of the time and I'm sure Pep pointed this out many games ago during this dismal run.

Is it just because Rodri is missing or their mischief-maker in chief Kevin de Bruyne is no longer making an impact in games like he has done for the past five or six years in our league? Or is this the worst possible scenario, where some have just stopped listening to Pep?

Magpies rely on Isak 

Newcastle United have to fear the worst over Alexander Isak if they continue to fall victim to Profit and Sustainability Rules.

He is a class act and will be a definite target for the Champions League big boys come the summer, if not before.

The one surefire benefit for Newcastle is they will receive a shed load of money because you have to say on current evidence, Isak is pretty close to being the best centre-forward in our league. 

He is quick, athletic, gets involved in build up play, can dribble and can finish. He's scored 24 goals this calendar year, three short of Alan Shearer's Newcastle record of 27. 

For a striker just approaching his prime years having scored 42 goals in 68 Premier League games for Newcastle he will be on the radar of all the truly big boys.

Newcastle have to fear the worst over Alexander Isak if they continue to fall victim to PSR Rules

Cherries on top 

I've got to give a mention to my hometown team Bournemouth for the progress they have made.

They made an extremely brave decision to swap Gary O'Neil for Andoni Iraola last year and there were a few blips at first. But they stand sixth in the Premier League table, a point ahead of champions Manchester City, and their tally of 29 points after 18 games is their best-ever top-flight return at this stage of a campaign.

They are playing a brand of football that is both entertaining, difficult to play against and capable of winning games. Their ground only holds just over 11,000 and the atmosphere that is created is very impressive. Even when the big boys come to town they are finding it difficult. Everyone in the area is now behind them and the manager deserves a great deal of credit for galvanising this talented group of players.