Manchester United fans probably realised that after the retirement of Sir Alex Ferguson their team would enter a transition period where United had to regroup after losing the club's biggest and most influential figure.

However, they would have never envisioned a fall from grace so quickly.

Jose Mourinho has been crying out for another centre-back ever since the summer transfer window opened but the board - despite honouring him a new 3-year contract back in January - have failed to deliver.

United are currently in sixth position with 26 points from 17 games and have already let in more goals than the whole of last season in the league (29).

This is just one of a plethora of worrying statistics that United fans will have to see throughout the remainder of the campaign, as their sinking ship shows no signs of coming back to the surface.

Mourinho seems to be breaking more and more unwanted records with each passing game, despite his position as manager looking safe until the end of the season.

Paul Pogba's consistent exclusion from the starting line-up as well as Chris Smalling - a player who has been heavily criticised by fans - being awarded a new contract, shows the club looks to be ignoring the opinion of the fans, leading United into turmoil in the process.

One stat in particular that will worry and frustrate the United faithful is the amount of ground covered per 90 minutes.

The Red Devils have been outrun in every single Premier League fixture so far, most notably against Tottenham on the opening day with Spurs running a total of 10 kilometres more.

Even in their comfortable 4-1 win over Fulham they were narrowly outrun by 0.4 of a kilometer, suggesting that United are either off the pace fitness-wise or are simply not putting the desired amount of effort in.

To add to this, United have made their worst start to a season since 1990 - before the Premier League had even been created - plus the 29 goals they have conceded is the most at this point in a season for a staggering 56 years.

Yes, you have to go back to the 1962/1963 season, even before England's World Cup triumph.

And to top it all off, Liverpool's 36 shots at United's goal in their comfortable 3-1 win at Anfield topped the list of all of United's league fixtures since the 2003/2004 season.

If this doesn't alarm United fans then we simply don't know what will.