16 Conclusions from Manchester United 5-0 Manchester City: Carrick and co. expose Guardiola, Amorim, Butt | OneFootball

Michael Carrick, Manchester United and Arsene Wenger just made Ruben Amorim, Pep Guardiola and Nicky Butt among many others look really rather silly indeed.

But there was justice at Old Trafford for one former Arsenal manager…

1) It will presumably and obviously be after his post-game debrief with Sir Alex Ferguson, but Michael Carrick must be looking forward to a congratulatory phone call from the delirious Arsene Wenger on his 5-0 thrashing of Manchester City.

2) The phrase that kept cropping up to explain how Manchester United landed on Carrick as their five-month safety blanket over closest contender Ole Gunnar Solskjaer was “more hands-on”.

It would be foolish to draw conclusions on that assessment after Carrick’s first 90 minutes in charge, even before taking into account how Solskjaer inflicted this exact result and scoreline on Pep Guardiola at Old Trafford six years ago, down to the 11-7 shot count.

These are not really the games on which Carrick ought to be judged. Ruben Amorim beat Liverpool, Chelsea and Newcastle this season but paid in part for mediocre displays, draws and defeats against teams in the bottom half. Those are the fixtures upon which this Champions League qualification charge must be built.

But what a result and what a performance, indelibly engineered by a coach determined and talented enough to make this work. The game plan and patterns of play were clear, the tactics were exquisite, the team selection was exemplary and the substitutions were superb. Carrick does indeed appear to be at the wheel.

3) The biggest yet most predictable call was the reinstatement of Kobbie Mainoo to the starting line-up for the first time this season in a game not against Grimsby.

Carrick referred to the 20-year-old’s experience in games of such magnitude as part of the reason for his inclusion and Mainoo did “thrive” as the Manchester United manager predicted, excelling in a midfield two alongside the brilliant Casemiro in front of a back four.

That was the template for the club’s best defensive display of the entire campaign. Sir Jim Ratcliffe and Jason Wilcox were right all along.

Patrick Dorgu didn’t look particularly anxious either when scoring the nerve-settling second. The whole experience felt like a proper cleansing of the Amorim era, the latest in a long line of turned corners in this infernal Manchester United maze.

4) With that said, it was funny to see something return alongside Luke Shaw, Harry Maguire, Casemiro, Amad and Bryan Mbeumo to the Manchester United starting line-up: the team leaks.

Amorim, for all his faults, actually managed to address that fairly early on. But hours before Carrick’s first game an accurate XI was circulated by Samuel Luckhurst of The Sun.

It did Manchester City no good, of course. But they’ll probably want to clamp down on that again soon.

5) There is a flipside to that coin; Manchester City were atrocious.

Three narrow offside calls and the excellence of Gianluigi Donnarumma spared them a more humiliating shot of the Old Trafford scoreboard as a makeshift defence eventually combusted, the midfield was bypassed and an imposing attack collapsed in on itself.

Manchester City were the better team for 20, maybe 25 minutes either side of half time and even then were held at arm’s length by a vulnerable opponent who not only comfortably contained them, but posed a far greater and more consistent threat.

A four-game winless run at the stage of the season when they generally reach their most imposing form would be damning even if they weren’t about to pluck a second of the league’s best players to make themselves the world’s biggest spenders in this January transfer window.

Much like Antoine Semenyo can’t be a one-man solution to their problems going forward, Marc Guehi alone is no panacea to those defensive issues.

6) There are injuries in that backline, but the Manchester United opener highlighted systemic and structural issues too.

Within seconds of Rayan Cherki lofting in Manchester City’s latest imprecise, actively damaging set piece, the hosts had launched a three-on-two attack from which Mbeumo would score.

It was his flick which created it after Maguire headed Cherki’s delivery back at him, isolating the Frenchman who was guarding a good 20 yards of space – and with it any prospect of the sort of quick counter Manchester United had leaned on all game.

For Cherki to be deployed as that screen was amateurish and whether Manchester United’s jumble of coaches highlighted it as a potential point of interest before the game or the players sensed an impromptu opportunity to target it, that failure is on Guardiola and his staff.

7) The visitors did not look much more stable in open play. Even beyond their two permissible United goals and three others that were disallowed, Manchester United had the game’s better chances.

Maguire clattered the bar with a header from a corner. Casemiro should have scored from the rebound of Amad’s saved shot. Dorgu and Mbeumo tested Donnarumma from crosses, both of which were aimed at Manchester City’s right-hand side.

Matheus Nunes cannot possibly be so important to this team that his absence reduces them to such a quivering wreck.

The starkest sight was of Rodri drowning in midfield, passing the ball to opponents on the edge of his own area and being booked for pulling back Dorgu in the centre circle for his only foul of the entire game. Perhaps he needs a refresher course.

8) It was probably a game too far for the encouraging Alleyne-Khusanov partnership, especially flanked with unfamiliar full-backs.

Nico O’Reilly was booked within a couple of minutes of his half-time introduction for the former – which meant he was restricted against Matheus Cunha for the second goal – while Rico Lewis really struggled on the right and picked up a yellow himself soon after.

Putting Rodri in front of that defence, with Phil Foden and Bernardo Silva as nominal runners tracking back, certainly felt like a choice. Nico Gonzalez might have usurped this current version of his midfield compatriot in terms of importance to Manchester City.

9) The best part of a really quite uneventful and tiresome first half was Anthony Taylor shaking his head like an exasperated parent after watching Maguire shepherd the ball out for a goal kick before gently placing Bernardo into that dip between the pitch and the advertising hoardings.

10) It is difficult to quantify but Maguire instinctively feels like the world’s best New Manager’s First Game player. The man oozes back-to-basics, keep-it-compact, fresh-start energy.

He even treated the supporters to a trademark marauding run past the halfway line on the hour mark, just after Casemiro dispossessed Erling Haaland with a stunning wraparound sliding tackle. Imagine even contemplating that sentence under Amorim. It is mad what a little shot of confidence and clarity can do for a player.

11) It was a particularly chastening experience for Haaland, who taken off in a triple substitution at 2-0 down with ten minutes remaining. Guardiola entrusted Divine Mukasa with closing that deficit in the second Premier League appearance of his career.

Those 14 Haaland touches can be compartmentalised if they are accompanied by a goal but Manchester United stymied and stifled him exceptionally well. That absurd start to the season has now bled into one goal in seven games.

That, Paul Scholes and Nicky Butt might be interested to learn, is also four wins in five meetings against Haaland for Lisandro Martinez, and a second clean sheet. The speed with which he nipped ahead of the static Norwegian to intercept one pass suggested that even if Haaland could “pick Martinez up and run with him”, he’d never get close enough.

13) Mbeumo’s flicks were particularly potent. That combination of clever movement to pull a defender out of position, followed by a deft touch to a team-mate, wreaked havoc with Manchester City.

It formed the basis of how the first offside goal and his own opener were constructed.

And there is little point commending the range, weight and choice of Fernandes’ passing. For a player who bears almost the entire creative burden of the team at times, to so consistently make the right decision under pressure is ludicrous. Manchester United will not replace him easily.

14) Carrick’s pre-match message to the omitted Cunha and Benjamin Sesko that “finishing the game is even more important these days” was realised in stunning fashion.

Sesko never made it off the bench but Cunha’s impact was immediate and obvious. His first touch was a flying block on the edge of his own box from a Bernardo shot, then the Brazilian generated an assist out of nothing with his push to the byline and glorious delivery for Dorgu, who caught Lewis napping.

As Carrick said, and as rarely seemed the case under Amorim, “we’ve got a good squad of players”. Manchester United might just have a manager capable of using it properly on a game-by-game basis.

15) The contrast with Manchester City was evident. Cherki was a slight improvement on Foden in the minutes after his introduction but soon settled into the general rule of his team’s mediocrity, by which point the only attacking option Guardiola could call upon from his bench was either Mukasa or, at a push, Tijanji Reijnders.

While Manchester United had a £74m unused substitute, Manchester City had basically no Plan B to an already flawed Plan A.

That chequebook might not be closed even when Guehi shuffles through the door. Arsenal are firmly in their heads.

16) Six offsides is the most Manchester United have had in a game since mid-February, and they scored from three of those attacks. It will be interesting to see if Carrick and his lambasted coaching team