Man Utd fans split on Carrick sack; have INEOS and Glazers damned United? | OneFootball

Some Man Utd fans want Michael Carrick sacked now and others wonder what will change as the owners have damned the club.

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This has not aged well Why I’m Backing United to Win the League made me laugh when I first read it, but now it’s hilarious. Hang your head in shame Mr Nicholson.

Has there ever been a worse prediction? Rob

Kids need to learn My son, and avid Manchester United supporter was very happy when they wen 2-0 up. I’m very old and can read a game. I told him at 30 minutes United were going to lose. He laughed. At 2-2 he ran to his bedroom, he’s 22! Can’t wait to see him tomorrow when he wants feeding. Tony Clarke

Fabian Hurzeler’s half-time team talk revealed “Lads….its Utd.” Patricio Del Toro (All joking aside, Brighton are incredible)

Carrick, INEOS, Glazers and the nature of rot I’ve agonised over this one, because I don’t want this to be a rant or an essay, but instead a dispassionate analysis of Man Utd. It’ll largely rehash and play back much of what we already know, but, if only for my sanity, I’m putting it on a page. So, let’s begin.

Firstly, Carrick has already been condemned by the court of the media. It’s almost like people couldn’t wait to stick the knife in. How dare he finish last season so strongly (on “easy mode” – fine, a game a week was nice for him, but it’s not like the players suddenly upgraded mid-season).

Now I get that he might not be the guy, but there seems to be particular venom at the notion of an ex-player managing United. Arteta was basically a no-one when he took over Arsenal. Kompany got relegated before the most almighty failure-to-promotion story. All of which is to say that Carrick – like Ole, who’s time at United remains criminally underrated – deserves a bit of time and grace, and an assessment of the bigger picture in which he’s working. He might not be the guy, but right now he absolutely isn’t the limiting factor.

The game is played on the pitch, by professional players. And in United’s case, several of them seem to have taken head injuries, such is the poverty of good decision making in recent weeks.

Dalot remains the most brain-fart player I’ve ever seen. Maguire is on a downward slope having dug deep last season in the hope of a World Cup call up. Martinez knows he’s one injury away from being moved on. Luke Shaw, in a surprise to absolutely no one, is injured because it’s a non-tournament year. Yoro hasn’t adapted well to the physicality of the Prem. Heaven is rusty, and seems to have been knocked by the Hulk fiasco. Mazroui is tidy but limited. De Ligt might actually not be alive anymore, who knows.

Our midfield rebuild was based around a player we probably could’ve bought at any point, but decided to do so on an ankle injury, a 29yr old with the legs of a 35yr old, and a £50m unproven player. Kobbie is the shining light but can’t do it all on his own and needs nurturing, Mount is stealing a living, Ugarte was never good enough.

Bruno has started the season poorly – I wonder how much Portugal’s World Cup affected him? – and then the rest of our forwards haven’t turned up, maybe barring a returning-from-injury Sesko, who still had a stinker last night. Cunha and Mbeumo haven’t taken the creative load from Bruno; teams know that they shut Bruno down, they shut United down.

Which brings us to Ineos, the Glazers, and the nature of rot. Carrick wasn’t backed in the summer. We bought poorly and sold even worse. The Glazers continue to leech from the club. Anyone who has bought anything from the megastore has put more money into the club than the Glazers. There’s an alternative world where the ~£100m a year they’ve cost the club was never extracted, and we’ve instead basically become the Bayern of Britain. But alas, we’ve instead been lumbered with those Yanks. And alongside them, Ineos, who tried to big brain the summer they played themselves. Who are doing to United what they did to Nice. Maybe if they were sole owners it would be different, but here we are.

So, our academy pipeline seems broken. Our ability to sell remains non-existent. Our ability to buy is patchy. Our current set of players melt under mild pressure and expectation (when the pressure was off last season, they turned up). Our stadium is falling apart. We’ve been undercapitalised for 20 years, and now the rest of the league has caught us up.

So fine, maybe Carrick isn’t the guy. But don’t think for a minute that anyone less than the second coming of Ferguson stands any better chance. Stephen Mears

…After the Manchester Derby, I had to take a walk in the garden to calm down. Then I had an epiphany. We are not stuck in some “Groundhog Day” time loop, we are exactly where the Corporation wants us to be. Even to an untrained eye, it is obvious that management does not intend to compete at the highest level. Just look at the level of investment in the Women’s team. Do just enough to remain relevant and hence, marketable. Is it any wonder then that this mediocrity has permeated every facet of the club?

Unfortunately I think most of us fans haven’t fully come to terms with this yet. It’s a bit like trying to save a relationship when the other person has already checked out. The late night chats, the bottles of wine, the therapy sessions, until one day, one gets a moment of clarity, like I did on my walk, and one begins to accept the reality of the situation… under the current owners, we will never become a Top Four team.

Once you accept this, you can adjust your expectations accordingly. We didn’t concede within 5 minutes – yay! We actually scored more than one goal – amazing! We didn’t concede – unbelievable! While we may be “too big to fail” (almost!), we can forget trophies and titles. We will always still make money from Exhibition games like the Harlem Globetrotters. Adidasmufc (What is truly worries me is that there may not be 3 teams with less fight than us)

…One thing in your article on Utd’s latest humbling struck a chord with me.

United have had a decent squad, good enough for at least top 4 every season post Fergie. They have also had proven managers, world class managers as well as less proven ones. But time and time again they get their pants pulled down by sides who just play as a team and are coached well.

Are utd against investing in coaching? Isn’t that what Jason Wilcox in his ivory tower is supposed to do? But yet again, we’ll sack the figure head of a manager, throw players under the bus and repeat the cycle of doom.

Utd need to look at some of these well coached sides that punch above their weight and realise that even when their manager gets poached for a bigger club, they still carry on as they were. There’s much more to a club than a figure head, Fergie is long gone, we need to do something different to expect something better. Jon, Cape Town

Is Will Ford a Man Utd fan? I almost spat out my morning chai when I read Will Ford’s article on how JJ Gabriel missed out on making a name for himself in one of the biggest clubs in the world. How he would probably have wished that it could have been him scoring that goal instead of the other kid.

This is the same guy that takes shots at other clubs in the league (Liverpool fan here) who have won more than his beloved ManU in the last decade and then he goes on to call a dumpster fire of a club in the next article when they got dumped out at home, blowing a 2-0 lead.

Poor Will didn’t see that coming.

But Good save F365, you gave him a redemption arc in the span of an hour- from taking potshots at a kid who wants away from a crumbling club to then saving face.

Does F365 owe this guy some kind of debt?

What a roller coaster, fun for us rival fans. M. Nair. Mumbai. LFC

(No, Will Ford is really not a Man Utd fan; he supports Chelsea because he is a southern posh boy – Ed)

Give Carrick until Christmas So after a shambolic record breaking defeat against Brighton, Carrick must be in top 3 to be sacked list. I usually refrain from being reactionary to a loss or 2, afterall the season isn’t over, we still have an entire PL campaign, 7 more matches at minimum in CL and possibly some run in the FA cup too, fingers crossed. The midfield combination is a bit new (Mainoo looks a man transformed though), and Carrick is probably trying his own tactics, so I would give him sometime before handing him over to HR for an exit interview.

But, it does seem like Carrick rode on the wave of Amorim’s and ETH’s work. As much as I hate Amorim (and his suffering in every press conference) and it shows he isn’t a great coach either after losing to Benfica yesterday, he did develop some tactics and patterns in the team. The famous Bruno Cunha Shaw Cunha Bruno Cunha passing triangle that frustrated Cherki in the derby last season wasnt all Carrick after a week or 2 of coaching. That was the trainings drilled in already by Amorim (and ETH to an extent).

No doubt Carrick build on it and inspired United to finish in top 3, but now the difficult work starts. I would give him until Christmas to see what he does, else we ll sack him and get a replacement (No Eddie Howie Please). I also see how little Santos is playing, and with Baleba getting fit soon, we could probably have better spent the Santos money on an LB. Rahil, MUFC, India (When it rains, it pours, the timing of JJ Gabriel wanting to leave couldn’t have come at a worse time).

Why? Sack him now because he is doomed – They show that statistic about leading at halftime at OT everytime…and it was always going to happen someday

– That was the kind of performance that will live forever in the memory, like the 4-0 loss under LVG. It was so bad that it may have single-handedly undone 6 months of credit Carrick had in the bank

– If you turned on the match and watched for 10 mins you’d honestly assume United were down to 10 or even 9, such was the positional dominance of Brighton. In both final thirds, on both flanks it felt like they were a man up, such was the contrast in structure and effort between the two

– Carrick will go, so we might as well do it now

– Despite all that, it is important to note that goals came from quite possibly the worst full back performances – on both flanks – I’ve ever seen from us

– Dalot is the symbol of this United squad. 250 matches, responsible for god knows how many goals to the opposition, and a vacuum of productivity going forward

– Finally, their first goal gets ruled out 100% of the time with VAR, and even as a United fan, I’m so glad there was no VAR anyway Ryan, Bermuda (Can we not find a single proven manager?)

…Having supported Manchester United since I was 6, back in the Busby days, I’ve grown up with some glorious highs and some ignominious lows. Sadly, the glorious highs are becoming a distant memory and the ignominious lows are becoming commonplace.

Tonight’s performance against Brighton (who were terrific, by the way) was just awful, in every way. We have players who just aren’t good enough, some who don’t even seen to try (I’m looking at you, Aiden Heaven, jogging around like it’s a kick-around in the park), and some who manage to completely disappear for long stretches of the game (Santos). But the most disappointing – and worrying – thing was that no one seemed to know what to do. Where was the structure, where were the patterns of play? Where was … the coaching and management?

The TV cut to Michael Carrick lots of times, but they might as well have used a photobooth still. He just stood there, with his arms folded cradling his face, looking completely lost. Hey Michael, how about giving them some direction, ordering them around? You could have looked at Brighton’s manager for a clue about how to do it. Fergie would have been apoplectic, with steam coming out of his ears (and flames from his mouth). Is this what you does during training sessions?

I’ve never, ever been a knee-jerk ‘sack the manager’ fan, but tonight I’m sorely tempted. Roger

…Carrick ran up a decent run of results when he took over because he only had the League to worry about. Maybe he’s going to try the same conditions by exiting the other competitions ASAP. Ken Charlatan

PS. I’m not a fan of sacking people but after how long does it stop being ‘too early’

…Seriously, after that shite, can anyone be blamed for wanting to leave the club?

It’d surprise me if any promising academy player were still at the club by the end of the month.

Carrick out. Ant MUFC

…Readers of a certain age will remember the tv shows Shooting Stars and The Fast Show. They may or may not remember the fairly recent renewals of these shows.

I say may or may not because they didn’t work. The motivation and thought processes were different. When they originally created them in the 90s, they were simply writing stuff they thought was funny. When they renewed the shows years later, they were trying to recreate what they did in the past. That’s a different mindset. It’s not “wait till everyone hears this funny joke I wrote”, more “I need to write something funny using whatever method I used 20 years ago.”

That’s what United have been doing since Ferguson left. They’re trying to retell or extend a story that ended over a decade ago when they need to be writing a completely new one. That has seen to the whole institution becoming a tribute act. They’re small time, know deep down they are, but are under pressure to look like big timers. They’re the new Tottenham.

They need to be changing the mindset and that starts by getting rid of everyone with that mindset. Rashford? Out. Maguire? Out. Shaw? Out.

They also need to forget about romanticism. United need to win and need to do it now. None of this giving managers a chance thing. The club got lucky with Ferguson 40 years ago. Stop trying to find the next one. Go for the best available and if they don’t work out, fire them and go for the next best one available. Hopefully at some point, you’ll happen across an exceptional manager but until then, stop hoping every failure you appoint is eventually going to solve everything if he just gets another few months. When’s the last time Madrid or Barca had a manager for more than 3 years?

Can we please get Conte in now? Eamonn, Dublin

Carrick has always been a ‘gutless fraud’ Just lost the second game in 4 days by one goal with four defenders and two holding midfielders on the pitch until the end.

I was about to spend 20 minutes writing about how I always thought Carrick was a gutless fraud as a player and his management is more of the same, compounded by the presence of Steve Holland (widely considered the brains behind Gareth Southgate’s scintillating England teams) and Jonathan b*tard Woodgate.

Amazingly, the last email I wrote on that very subject is still available online and relevant today: