Ole Gunnar Solskjaer's time as Manchester United's boss is at an end.

In one of the most unsurprising developments of the season, the United hierarchy moved swiftly to show Ole the door after the club's miserable 4-1 defeat to Watford on Saturday.

It was, perhaps, the most jarring defeat in a long line of remarkable underwhelming performances and proved to be the final straw for Ole's tenure.

Having steered his beloved club out of murky waters when he first took the helm, there were genuine hopes this season that Ole could lead the team to the title.

Having signed the likes of Jadon Sancho, Rafael Varane and, of course, Cristiano Ronaldo, it looked as though Ole was cobbling together a title-contending side.

Sadly, after an encouraging start, the United form has veered alarmingly off a cliff.

p1fl0p3ir2fpc143mp039vpelb.jpg

Enter Giveaway

The brutal loss to bitter rivals Liverpool may have been the crowning glory in the last few months of misery for United fans, but shipping four at Watford simply is unacceptable.

The club issued a statement, thanking Ole for his work, and wishing him well in the future:

"Ole will always be a legend at Manchester United and it is with regret that we have reached this difficult decision. While the past few weeks have been disappointing, they should not obscure all the work he has done over the past three years to rebuild the foundations for long-term success.

"Ole leaves with our sincerest thanks for his tireless efforts as Manager and our very best wishes for the future. His place in the club’s history will always be secure, not just for his story as a player, but as a great man and a Manager who gave us many great moments. He will forever be welcome back at Old Trafford as part of the Manchester United family."

Michael Carrick will now take charge of the team for forthcoming games, while the club looks to appoint an interim manager to the end of the season.

The Glazer's are also said to be moving for Zinedine Zidane, but time will tell as to whether that particular pursuit bears meaningful fruit.

More to follow...

This is a breaking news article that is currently being updated. More details will be published shortly. Please refresh this page for the latest information.

GiveMeSport (GMS) is a sport media outlet providing exclusive player and manager interviews, and providing fans with up-to-date features, match previews and match reviews. We share breaking domestic and European sports news, results, fixtures and stats, as well as photos and videos on trending sports topics. As the number one Facebook Sport Publisher, GMS reaches over 30M unique visitors monthly, including 26M Facebook fans, more than ESPN (19.2M) or SkySports (11.64M).

GIVEMESPORT is part of the Snack Media Group, a leading independent sports digital media company with over 70 million sports fans, specialising in multi-channel content creation, distributed at scale, through data driven engagement strategies.