Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola has made a powerful observation about former Manchester United head coach Ruben Amorim and interim boss Michael Carrick.
Pep Guardiola and his men will travel to Old Trafford on Saturday afternoon and the former Manchester City manager won’t cross paths with Ruben Amorim again.
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Amorim’s reign at Manchester United ended last week and the 40-year-old former Sporting CP manager was at the Premier League club for only 14 months.
Man Utd sacked Portuguese coach Amorim and coach Darren Fletcher temporarily took charge of the Red Devils for two matches as Red Devils caretaker manager.
Darren Fletcher’s spell as Man Utd boss ended earlier this week and Michael Carrick made his sensational return after his appointment as interim head coach.
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Manchester United interim head coach Michael Carrick records a podcast at the Carrington training complex in 2026 in Manchester, England.
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Pep Guardiola sends a message about Man Utd interim head coach Michael Carrick and Ruben Amorim ahead of the Man City match
Michael Carrick’s role as Manchester United interim manager is expected to lead to the Red Devils abandoning the tactical system that Ruben Amorim deployed.
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Amorim divided United fans by using the tactics that had previously led him to success in his native homeland with Sporting CP, with the Red Devils adopting a three-man backline.
Carrick’s tactics during his Middlesbrough spell saw the 44-year-old ex-Man Utd man use a 4-2-3-1 formation, which is a stark difference to Amorim’s 3-4-2-1 set-up.
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Speaking at his pre-match press conference on Friday afternoon, Pep Guardiola admitted that United could play “extraordinarily well” with a four-man backline.
“When you play with five at the back and it doesn’t work, and when you play with four and it doesn’t work, you have to play with five,” he said, as per the Manchester Evening News.
“With four, you can play extraordinarily well and with five you can play extraordinarily well. If you changed it and it was fine, then everyone would be a manager.”
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Pep Guardiola makes a clear-cut point about what Man Utd boss Michael Carrick could do vs Man City
Manchester City boss Guardiola believes that the Red Devils could make the “easy” pivot to Carrick’s approach so long as the ‘right’ players in the team are fielded.
“It would be easy,” he said.
“It’s not like that. The players look best when the team works well and they don’t look the best when it doesn’t work well.”
United will host City at Old Trafford on Saturday afternoon for a 12:30pm kick-off time in the final Manchester derby in the 2025-26 Premier League season.
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