Man Utd ‘weak, flim-flam, charity shop’ summer leaves Carrick ‘irrelevant’

The Manchester United fall-out continues with many fans suggesting that Michael Carrick is actually not the problem.

Send your thoughts to theeditor@football365.com. Maybe read the Moods first.

An even worse prediction
Rob asks if there has ever been a worse prediction than John Nicholson predicting United winning the league this season.

I remember one. It was in the summer of 2003 when someone made the prediction that Tottenham would finish ahead of Arsenal and that Robbie Keane was as good a player as Thierry Henry. As a reminder, that season Tottenham finished 14th with half as many points as Arsenal, who became the only team in the past 130 years to go a season unbeaten. Thierry Henry was named the greatest ever Premier League player and Robbie Keane was, er, not.

That prediction was made on these very pages by a (checks notes) Mr John Nicholson.
Jaimie “Long and Bitter Memory” Kaffash, AFC, North London

Backing Brighton was a no-brainer
Spare a thought for the eejit trader who, possibly in a pre-emptive show of solidarity with Man U’s ineptitude, priced up Brighton at 3/1 last night. Madness. Thank you kind sir/madam.

On the JJ Gabriel front, and if they’re aware of it, 365 understandably can’t/won’t post the very interesting stuff I found on a Gooner fan site I wandered into this morning (eesh) – shewore dot com. I feel sorry for the boy.
RHT/TS x

(That Zinedine Groß fella looks a prospect)

Carrick is irrelevant
We had a chance, at the end of last season. We finished 3rd, booked UCL football, and a lot of our rivals were in flux. An aggressive, decisive, ambitious summer and we could feasibly close some distance to City and Arsenal. That was the dream, but it was also a real opportunity.

Instead, we had a weak, flim-flam, charity shop of a summer, while all our rivals – and by that I mean basically every team in the league – recruited aggressively. And so I haven’t been surprised in the slightest by our relentlessly awful start to the season.

Carrick is irrelevant. I don’t mean that as an insult. There’s no manager in the league who could perform at United. We’re a club trying to struggle on with a great succubus on our back. We’ll never compete properly with the Gl***rs as our owners.

And for rival fans who revel in our downfall, fair enough. Laugh it up. But remember, Manchester United are (were) one of the greatest institutions in world football, and have been utterly destroyed by despicable, rapacious owners – so don’t think it couldn’t happen to you too.
Ben, depressed

Man Utd should back Carrick like Arsenal backed Arteta
Cards on the table, I am an Arsenal fan. And I have written to the mailbox in the past with tongue and cheek comments about why club A should keep manager B, so they can destroy said club. But I am really getting bored with this rinse and repeat doom cycle Man U have deployed over the last 15 years (I can’t imagine how their fans must feel).

Notions of Einstein and his comments regarding the height of madness come to mind but Man U must really try something different. Getting rid of Carrick now will allow a new manager to come in with a bounce and have all the excuses for underachievement over the next 18 months set in stone. They’re not his players, he’s trying to implement his system, he needs two transfer windows, once he starts parking in the manager’s parking space….

The experimental side of my nature would love to see what happens if they stick with a manger for say 5 years. We already have one test case in regards to this at a big club in Mikael Arteta. A not particularly gifted tactician or manager for that matter but a stabilising influence and we’ve seen how this has turned Europa League qualifiers (and not even that at times) into Premier League champions and Champions League contenders. Does having the same OK manager at a club for a significant amount of time behave in the same way as compound interest? Not a lot to begin with but over the years you watch that nest egg grow.

Ole was that guy at Man U. A good egg, a safe pair of hands and to borrow from a common un-misconception or conception if you will, someone who knows the club. He would’ve learned on the job similar to Arteta and as the years went by would’ve became more secure in his position and consequently, become braver and better. The tangible improvements would be there for all to see.

I just want to know, is that all there is to success at a big club? Spend money on players and just have the same guy year after year. Come on Man U be brave, back your man.
Seamus, Sweden

Or Klopp
How long do people think it takes to rebuild a team? How many summer windows till it’s right?

Maybe, instead of asking chirping fans, we should ask Klopp (3 years and a whole new team before competing), Arteta (3 years and a whole lot of spending before competing), Pep (1 year but the squad was already bought and there were still more additions), Sir Alex (5 years and a lot of new team menbers brought in and through). etc

So, why would people be chirping already, not a year in and two summer windows (one nothing to do with the manager) down? As a commenter BTL noted, we are a late worldie and a VAR error from 5th. In addition, we’re a competent referee from victors in this match too.

If nothing else, the last few games have confirmed what was never really in doubt – that Dalot is a Make a Wish kid masquerading as a footballer, that Zirkzee is where attacking threat goes to die and that plenty of work is still required before we talk of being ready to really compete. Lacey is pretty special though.

It’s a long road back from where we ended up the season before last. It’s not all done with a magic wand. So would the plastics please shut up.

These are the kinds of people who would complain they can’t live in their new house even though there’s no roof let alone fixtures.
Badwolf

No, that performance was a sackable offence
I didn’t complain when Carrick was given the full time gig, not because I was sold on him, more because there wasn’t much else out there. We’d have been looking at the likes of Iraola, Glasner, Silva et al. All with their merits, but none proven at the very top of the game. All options available represented risk.

What I hoped for from Carrick was to be a steady hand. I didn’t expect him to be lifting the biggest silverware, I didn’t expect a serious title challenge this season, I just hoped for a comfortable 3rd-5th finish, knockouts of the CL and to check who was on the managerial merry-go-round again next summer. I never thought he was Mr Right, but possibly Mr Right Now.

Unfortunately, all the very worst reservations and concerns are coming to pass. That second half last night was absolutely diabolical. The defending for all three of their goals was laughable, but they could easily have had six. There was no plan or coherence in attack, the players look laboured, half paced and clueless. I think Dalot was playing p*ssed.

I’m incredibly tired of chopping and changing managers, but I’d rather we were just ruthless and did it during the international break. We know where it’s going to end, so rip the plaster off now with more of the season left. We do now have some options; namely Eddie Howe and Antonio Conte, but I suspect Emery could be tempted from Villa too after their summer dealings. All have caveats, but all would have us playing better football than that and likely finish us 3rd-5th. That was a genuinely sackable performance last night.
Lewis, Busby Way

The Core e-mail
I rewatched an early 2000s sci-fi gem recently: The Core.

The premise is gloriously ridiculous. The Earth’s core stops rotating, the planet’s magnetic field begins to collapse, and a group of scientists has to travel to the centre of the Earth to get it moving again. It is exactly the sort of film that makes you wonder whether Hollywood writers have ever actually spoken to a scientist.

It currently sits at 41% on Rotten Tomatoes, which I think is a little unfair.

I’m hoping this isn’t a spoiler for a film released in 2003, but what makes The Core work for me is not really the destination. It is the process.

Everyone has a different skill. Everyone has a different job. And the whole thing only works if those people function together.

That got me thinking about football.

Because every great team needs a core.

Not necessarily three central midfielders. Not even necessarily three players who look particularly similar. A proper core should give you different ways of making the team function. Someone to give you control. Someone to create. Someone to destabilise the opposition. Different pieces, different qualities, but all of them important to the machine.

And that is the basis of the best three teenagers (18 or under) right now I would want at the core of a future team.

1. Max Dowman
2. Rio Ngumoha
3. Ayyoub Bouaddi

Dowman is the one who can make a team unpredictable.

He is still only 16, but there is already an unusual calmness to his game. His two goal performance against Ipswich was the latest reminder that this isn’t just a kid with nice highlights. There is already an unusual completeness to his game: he can receive, carry, combine and arrive in dangerous areas.

Then there is Ngumoha, who brings something completely different.

He is 18 now and, unlike Dowman and Bouaddi, he is primarily a forward rather than a midfielder. That is precisely why he belongs on my list. A future team doesn’t just need someone to run the game; it needs someone capable of changing it.

Ngumoha gives you that directness. He wants to attack his man, stretch the pitch and make defenders turn. We saw that again in Liverpool’s CL win over Atlético Madrid, when his dribbling on the left helped create the move for Mac Allister’s winner.

And then there is Bouaddi, who might be the most obvious representation of the Core idea.

He is the one I would trust to help hold the whole thing together.

City describe him as a ball playing midfielder and a defensive midfield operator, which tells you a lot about what I see in him: someone who can give a team structure while still having the technical quality to progress the ball.

So, no, these aren’t my three man midfield.

They are my three man core.

Bouaddi gives you control and balance. Dowman gives you imagination and invention. Ngumoha gives you pace, aggression and a way of attacking space.

They don’t all do the same thing, and that’s exactly the point.

When I think about building a team for the future, I’d rather have three players who give me different ways to make that team function than three players who simply occupy the same spaces.

Which brings me back to The Core.

The spectacular stuff gets all the attention, but the thing underneath is what keeps everything moving.

In football, as in that wonderfully daft film, you need the right people in the right places, all pulling in the same direction.

These are the three teenagers I would want at the centre of mine.
Gaptoothfreak, Man. Utd., New York (P.S. Before anyone asks: yes, I know JJ Gabriel exists. I simply didn’t realise I needed to finish this mail before he tried to leave United)