For a little while on a foul night at Old Trafford, it was starting to feel like the next big job cut at Manchester United might actually be Ruben Amorim himself.

His team trailed third-from-bottom Ipswich Town, the gap separating United from the relegation zone was in danger of going down to 10 points, and Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s worst nightmare was becoming a reality.

After a week dominated by grim news of more redundancies aimed at saving money to pump into the first-team, here was more evidence of just how far United have fallen.

No matter how bad things get at this club, though, it seems they can always rely on Bruno Fernandes. The Portuguese playmaker might not be everyone’s cup of tea, but through the wind and rain here he emerged to dig United out of another mess of their own making.

Three goals from Fernandes set-pieces meant that, remarkably, he has now been involved in the last six scored by his team.

This being United, it wasn’t that simple of course. After contributing to his team conceding a calamitous opening goal, new signing Patrick Dorgu was sent off in the 43rd minute for a sickening challenge on Omari Hutchinson.

Having taken the lead, lost it and then led again, Amorim’s side deserve credit for seeing out the second half comfortably with 10 men.

‘All the things in the game were against us and we fought through it and clearly deserved the three points,’ said United’s head coach.

Dorgu’s first error came in the fourth minute when he and Jaden Philogene chased Jacob Greaves’ long ball from deep.

Who was more to blame for what happened next, Dorgu or Andre Onana? Hard to say other than it was a horrible mix-up. Onana raced off his line but Dorgu didn’t appear to see him as he touched the ball past his goalkeeper, leaving Philogene to walk the ball into an empty net.

Amorim stood watching in the pouring rain with a look of incredulity. The optimism of Marcus Rashford’s second-minute goal in his first game against Ipswich at Portman Road in November must have felt like a distant memory.

‘Everybody when they watched the first goal thought “here we go again”,’ he said afterwards.

Just as they did at Goodison Park on Saturday, United rallied and once again it was the set-piece prowess of Fernandes that did the trick.

The United captain was given a chance to whip in a free-kick from the left in the 22nd minute when Jens Cajuste fouled Alejandro Garnacho. It was a cross that invited a finish but it came off Ipswich captain Sam Morsy and flew into the net.

Four minutes later, United were ahead. This time Fernandes sent over a corner and Alex Palmer saved from Harry Maguire and Diogo Dalot before Matthijs de Ligt got to the loose ball first to fire into the roof of an empty net.

At that stage it felt like the drama was over, but this is not a United side that likes to make life easy for themselves.

No sooner had Dorgu been sent flying by Hutchinson than he exacted brutal revenge on the Ipswich player in almost exactly the same spot in front of the dugouts.

You could hear the sound of Dorgu’s right boot connecting with Hutchinson’s left shinpad from the stands.

‘It was a red card, I was right in front of it,’ said Ipswich boss Kieran McKenna. ‘There’s heavy damage on his shin, but you hope it’s nothing serious.’

As Hutchinson writhed in pain and VAR looked at the replays, it became clear that Dorgu’s forgettable night was coming to an end.

Craig Pawson advised referee Darren England to go to the pitchside monitor and United’s £29.4million signing was on his way.

Amorim’s decision to sacrifice Garnacho for substitute Noussair Mazraoui was a peculiar one given that the Argentina winger had once again been United’s most potent attacking threat.

Garnacho certainly looked unhappy with it as he followed Dorgu down the tunnel. ‘I’m obviously going to talk to him about that,’ said Amorim.

If the plan was to hold on until half-time, it didn’t work. Two minutes into added time, Liam Delap and De Ligt fought to reach Philogene’s cross from the right, but neither made contact and he claimed his second goal of the night as the ball bounced beyond a stranded Onana into the far corner.

Back came United again. Two minutes after the interval another corner and another tempting delivery from Fernandes allowed Maguire to stoop in front of Philogene to head them back in front.

This time they made a better job of defending Onana’s goal to calm any lingering concerns they could be dragged into the relegation battle. Who thought we would be saying that about Manchester United?