Ruben Amorim keen to see progress as wounded Manchester rivals meet

Ruben Amorim wants to see improvements and a fighting spirit as his evolving Manchester United side head to rivals Manchester City in Sunday's derby.

The recently appointed 39-year-old head coach is looking for a statement performance as the Red Devils travel to the Etihad Stadium for his first all-Manchester clash in the hot seat.

Sunday’s match is intriguingly poised, given reigning Premier League champions City have won just one of their last 10 games in all competitions, losing seven of those matches.

Meanwhile, United may be buoyed by Thursday’s 2-1 Europa League comeback win at Viktoria Plzen but losses to Arsenal and Nottingham Forest have left them with their lowest points tally at this stage of a season since 1986.

"I am always looking forward to coaching Manchester United, especially in the derby, but we have so much to focus (on)," head coach Amorim told MUTV.

"We are focused on to improve day by day, and we want to see different things.

"I think we did a good job in the first half against Arsenal (in an eventual 2-0 loss), so we have that ability, we have players to do it, and we will try to do it again and try to win the game."

Asked how much the late victory in Czechia boosts United, he said: "It’s so important when you go to prepare the next game you have the feeling of winning.

"You don’t (get) carried away about the winning – we should win this type of game that we had Thursday – so now we’re going to another game, we need to win.

"We lost the other two in the Premier League. We have to have this feeling of winning these kind of games, and we will be ready.

"Of course, we know that we have a lot to improve, a lot of things are changing here, but we will fight for the game."

United have endured a difficult time at